Return of the Runebound Professor

“And who would you be?” Noah asked. He decided not to address the fact that he’d just been called fat. His eyes flicked to Pirren and Moxie discreetly put her hand on her waist, likely getting in contact with a seed stored somewhere within her clothes in case the situation soured. “I don’t recall you mentioning that we had even more company.”

Pirren cringed back, but Noah couldn’t tell if she was looking in his or the girl’s direction. She nearly went to wring her hands together before she caught herself and forced them down to her sides.

“It was how I got you into the auction. I — I couldn’t get in any other way. Why does it matter? You didn’t say you had to be alone. This was the best way to do it.”

Aylin inclined his head, indicating that Pirren was telling the truth. Then again, the ‘best way’ didn’t necessarily mean the best way for all of them. It could have just as easily meant the best way for her. Noah studied the girl silently for several seconds.

Without releasing his domain, it was hard to tell much about her. She didn’t have any runic pressure rolling off her. She had no massive muscles or obvious magical weapons. She just looked like a girl with a mask and silver hair.

That didn’t make Noah’s guard drop in the slightest. It wasn’t hard to guess that the girl was the demon that had gotten Pirren access to the auction. Either that or she worked for whoever had done it, but Noah was leaning toward the former given Pirren’s unease.

Well, no point throwing a fit. Might as well just keep on with it. Having someone else in the seat really doesn’t make much of a difference when pretty much everybody here is announcing their presence anyway.

The roar of the crowd building all around them was remarkably effective at preventing an awkward silence. One couldn’t have an awkward silence without the latter half, but there was only so long he could avoid saying anything.

“You seem to have me at a disadvantage,” Noah said to the girl. “You know my name, but I don’t know yours.”

Pirren shifted, probably preparing to introduce them. The girl’s head tilted ever so slightly and the snake demon’s mouth snapped shut without so much as uttering a word.

“You don’t,” the girl agreed. She made no move to elaborate.

“Are you going to tell me? Or am I going to have to come up with a name for you?” Noah asked, repressing a sigh. It was one thing to have another demon sitting around next to him. He didn’t mind that too much — but if they were going to be a bother, that made everything just a little more distasteful.

Either she gives me a name or I give her a dumb one. I wonder what —

“You may call me Yoru.”

Noah blinked in surprise. That had been fast. He’d fully expected to have to come up with something. He glanced at Aylin out of the corner of his eye, then realized it was pointless. The girl hadn’t said that Yoru was her name. She’d said that he could call her Yoru. That was just an instruction and couldn’t have been a lie even if Yoru wasn’t her name.

Sure enough, Aylin didn’t do anything. Noah looked back to Yoru and shrugged. Her real name didn’t matter. It was kind of useless at the moment. He had no idea who any of the demons in the city were, so a name wouldn’t have changed anything.

“Yoru, then,” Noah said. “And why is it that you were so kind as to invite us along to your spot in the auction?”

“I didn’t,” Yoru replied. “This is Pirren’s spot. It is under her name. I have not announced myself.”

I thought everyone had to announce themselves? Aylin indicated the demon was lying about the whole entry fee thing. I was under the impression he was just going for a bribe. Can you actually do that?

“I was under the impression everyone had to announce themselves,” Moxie said, saving Noah from having to ask himself. “Or did you actually have to pay someone off to conceal yourself?”

“A simple retainer to a lowly Rank 5 has no need to announce themselves. They are beneath notice.”

Noah’s eyes narrowed. Another unverifiable statement. Yoru obviously wasn’t wrong. Nobody would care if Pirren brought one or two random demons along with her. They were beneath notice — but even an idiot could have seen that Yoru wasn’t Pirren’s retainer. The snake demon was practically trembling in her boots.

Unfortunately, Yoru hadn’t claimed to be a retainer. Noah’s brow furrowed slightly as he studied the girl. It was like trying to analyze a brick wall. There wasn’t a shred of body language to reveal her true thoughts. The mask on her face certainly didn’t help.

Is she deliberately avoiding telling the truth to skirt Aylin’s powers? It’s definitely been long enough for rumors about him to get out. Other demons should have heard of what happened to Rekeba by now, so Yoru might know he’s a Knowledge Demon.

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Noah pulled a chair at the far side of the table out for Moxie, then sat down in the chair beside it. Debating over Yoru’s goals was pointless until he had more information. He wasn’t going to let himself get sidetracked.

Moxie sat down beside him with a small nod of appreciation. Pirren glanced around nervously before taking a chair in the very center of the table, as far away from both Noah and Yoru as she could possibly get. Aylin took the chair to Moxie’s right at the table head, positioning himself so that Noah could see him without turning.

Nice, Aylin. Good positioning.

“How am I meant to sell a Rune here?” Noah asked Pirren, tapping a finger on the table.

Pirren started, nearly jumping out of her chair. She jerked her head to look at him. “What? It got really loud and I was distracted. Sorry.”

I don’t think it was the crowd that had you distracted.

“A rune,” Noah repeated. “How do I put it up for auction?”

“Oh. We just have to call an attendant. There should be a way to do that somewhere.” Her eyes darted around. Yoru turned to look over her shoulder and Pirren followed her gaze to a rope at the edge of the balcony. “Ah. Found it.”

Pirren rose from her chair and gave the rope a tug. It slid down and a dull kachunk rose up from a mechanism above. Pirren stood there for a second, then released the rope. It slid back into place. She cleared her throat and walked back over to her chair.

“That should call someone. I think.”

Maybe having the demon that basically got kicked out of auctions be my guide for one wasn’t the best idea.

***

Yoku watched on as an attendant entered the room and started speaking with Spider, discussing the terms of the auction and the fees the auction house planned to take. The mask on her face did absolutely nothing to obstruct her view, but she didn’t pay any attention to their discussion. It was irrelevant. She was far more concerned with Spider himself.

How odd. He’s barely shown any reaction to me. He had some weight to him when he first saw me, but almost nothing afterward. What sort of demon sees an unannounced intruder on their plans and just shrugs and ignores them?

I don’t understand how this demon have put Taleel in such danger. He’s not taking me seriously, and it’s stopping me from reading him.

A finger of irritation traced down Yoku’s spine. It had been so long since she’d left her sanctum that she couldn’t remember the last time someone had dismissed her like this. She had seen cities rise and fall. She’d watched demons claw their way to the peak of their power and given them a brief instant to revel in their victory before ripping them down and tearing their soul to shreds.

I will not be dismissed by a mere child.

Yoku constrained her annoyance. She hadn’t lived this long to be driven to actual anger by nothing more than a cog in her plans. Someone as insignificant as Spider had no influence over her.

And someone as insignificant as Spider will not be allowed to escape my light. I will know him, and I will use him.

Yoku pulled a large vial from her pocket that she’d prepared for this exact reason. A shimmering blue liquid glistened within it, as bright as moon shining through a still lake. She couldn’t quite remember how much the batch it came from had cost, but it was something in the realm of one hundred thousand gold.

Starshimmer. It was pure, distilled power. Enough magical energy to fill a full set of Rank 5 runes twice over. Most demons would have slaughtered their entire families for just a single drop.

Yoku had destroyed the entire bottle with Mindkiller — a vile poison that ripped a demon’s mind to shreds and left them a mindless puppet, forcing them to obey every command they heard for an hour before their body shriveled away and died.

But, for the briefest of instants after a demon ingested it, they would have a second of clarity where they could understand just what happened to them. The poison carried with it a cruel, humiliating fate worse than mere death.

There was only a single part of it that Yoku needed. The flicker of clarity before the end came. The one moment where the one who drank the potion knew who had betrayed them, and their full attention and hatred was focused entirely on her. The moment where she could truly take their measure, even if it never came to pass.

Spider made his way back to the table and sat down, having imbued his rune onto a piece of treated Wastebeast leather and given it to the attendant for the auction. He glanced over to Yoku and a flicker of interest passed through his eyes at the vial.

“Would you care to share a drink?” Yoku asked, putting a finger on the top of the vial. “A gesture of will for those who sit at my table.”

Then she unleashed the full power of her runes. The world erupted in energy visible only to her. Moonlight poured down from the air and illuminated the balcony, drawing it under her influence. Wisps of black smoke trickled from every single one of the demons around her as she weighed the probabilities in the future she had created.

“Oh? What is it?” Spider asked, reaching for the vial. “Why does it feel like you’ve got a rune trapped in this?”

Yoku smiled. As the last words slipped from Spider’s mouth, she focused her power and peered into the probabilities of the future. A future where the probability of Spider drinking from the vial was absolute. One where the probability of his death was set in stone. A future where she witnessed the full potential of the influence he possessed and weighted it against herself.

And, in that moment, the sky went black.

Yoku’s blood turned to ice. A sea of black smoke exploded from Spider like the roar of a furious god. It poured past her and covered the ground, climbed up the walls, rose up toward the moonlight shining down on them.

Its immense, oppressive aura drove into Yoku’s chest like a thick iron spike. Freezing claws wrapped around her chest and squeezed as her sightless eyes widened and the breath locked in her throat.

The most likely results of the future she had crafted unfurled before Yoku’s eyes. Spider would take the Mindkiller. He would drink a poison that would do immense damage even to her — and he would survive.

All the years of her existence, the enormous power of the rising moon, bore down on Spider. She weighed everything that she was against everything that Spider had been — and her moonlight vanished under a vast sea of all-consuming black nothingness.

If Spider drank from the vial, there was only one probability that was completely and utterly absolute. It would not be today. It might not even be within a hundred years, but the probabilities would never allow themselves to realign.

Yoku would die.

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