The gray-eyed girl glanced at Reiden, seeking permission to speak. The man's response was to release her, but without taking his eyes off her, keeping one hand firmly gripped on the handle of the parry dagger sheathed at his waist, while his sword on the other side remained untouched…for the time being.
"M-my name is Tristessa," she introduced herself, feeling her mouth dry and forced to moisten her lips before continuing. "Tristessa Irandell."
The mercenaries looked at each other, obviously unfamiliar with her family name.
"A pleasure, Tristessa Irandell," the old woman said, looking at her without blinking once since she sat down. "So tell me, Tristessa Irandell, what brings you to this Gods-forsaken place? You see, my employees here can become quite nervous when there're people lurking around in the dark."
"I-I didn't mean to alert your mercenaries!" she said quickly. "You see, Madame, I'm on my way to Entrana. I was just looking for a place to rest until the sun rises."
"Just like us! We decided to spend the night here, our destination being the Fishing Village in the Bay of Rün. We always find some lost soul there who needs to conduct business…"
"Madame Luchie," Reiden warned, interrupting her.
"Oh, right, right. Excuse this old woman, dear Reiden, sometimes my tongue gets unknotted and starts rambling nonstop," said Madame Karla, laughing. She leaned back against the headrest and began to stuff tobacco leaves into a long, black wooden pipe. "May I ask why you want to go to Entrana, Tristessa Irandell? Perhaps to kidnap children, massacre innocents, or…?"
"N-no! I'm not one of those Shadow Queen-worshipping madwomen!" Tristessa bellowed, her anger blinding her so quickly that she didn't notice the mercenaries shifting slightly in their seats, watching her every move. "I want to see the Coven destroyed!"
"Of course, who wouldn't? But you'll understand my concerns: you're a young woman from the south, arriving via the Abandoned Meridion Highway... I admit that the witches of the Coven usually lurk far from the most obvious paths, but more than one turned out to be a hopeless fool who tried to attack our humble caravan..."
Suddenly, the three men, whose names Tristessa didn't know, threatened to draw their weapons, which were a great-axe, a flamberge-type sword, and a firestone thaumaturgy wand; the woman, on the other hand, had her multi-shot crossbow resting against her right shoulder.
"I come from the Mercer-Archeos family home… They are my friends, and the Coven will attack them in a few days," she explained, her anger giving way to desperation, so much so that not even the mercenaries' weapons could intimidate her. "I need help to save them!"
"The parents of one of the Priestesses of the Black Eye," the mercenary woman hissed, raising her helmet-obscured gaze to show Tristessa the animosity she felt reflected in her icy, dark stare.
"I share Lufreya's sentiments. If you think I care about the fate of a banished family, you are sorely mistaken." Madame Luchie rendered Tristessa speechless with her utterly insensitive comment. She lit her pipe and inhaled, filling her aging lungs before releasing the smoke in rings. "Maybe you're not a witch, maybe you are… What do you think, kids? Melian?"
"If she is a witch, the Coven standards have certainly dropped. Her soul alone gives me the creeps, everything else… I don't know. At least the last one who tried to kill us was laughing as we cut her to pieces. This one seems like an ordinary girl you might find walking the streets of Entrana," the wand-wielding mercenary opined, scratching his head of jet-black curls. "What about you, Dom?"
"A weakling." That was all the tall, bald mercenary who owned the flamberge.
"I agree with Melian," Lufreya said, then looked at the missing mercenary and Reiden. "You guys?"
"I'll pass. I'm not good at judging people," said the mercenary with tangled blond hair and one of his front teeth missing. His right hand still gripped the handle of the massive axe he carried slung across his back, capable of splitting her in half with a single blow. "Only you remain, boss."
The man in question walked around Tristessa until he was almost in front of her. His hands never let go of the handles of his weapons, and she was more than certain that with a single movement, Reiden could land a fatal blow without her even noticing. It was the imposing presence of a professional standing before someone who barely knew the weight of a weapon in her hands.
"There's something about her I definitely don't like…" the mercenary judged, then turned his back on the nervous girl and looked at his employer. "You have the final say, Madame."
Madame Karla meditated in silence for a long minute. Night had already fallen, and not only was Tristessa being eaten away from within by all that anxiety, but the bad feeling she had begun to feel hours ago had firmly lodged itself in her heart.
"I still think this girl has the qualities of a witch of the Coven, but I don't want to dismiss all of your opinions," the old woman finally said. "What do you say we leave the final decision in the hands of the Saint of Fortune?"
"Perhaps she knows Valdrek as the Saint of Machinery and Progress," the axe-wielding mercenary suggested.
"Purely heterodox interpretations, Bran."
"Wait! A saint? What decision are you talking about?" Tristessa interrupted the old woman and the mercenary. Neither of them responded, but the bald mercenary, rising from the stone block and drawing his sword, took it upon himself to do so:
"Stupid girl. The Saint of Fortune will decide whether you live or die."
Indeed. Life or Death.
It was the worst thing she feared. All that talk and debate had led to this, and Tristessa had tried to convince herself it wouldn't be so. So naive, so innocent... She was in a world where Death was a bargaining chip, and she still took it lightly, even after tasting it several times.
"To put it simply, Tristessa Irandell: everything in this life can be negotiated, from a piece of moldy bread to an Emperor's pardon. That's why I want you to try to buy your innocence," the old woman suggested. "Valdrek watches over the virtuous in greed and the lost souls who are worthy of a little luck. Offer me something that will make me say you're not a Coven witch. If the Saint of Fortune is on your side, you'll surely succeed."
"And if I have nothing to offer you?" she asked, incredulous at the merchant's irrational way of resolving a conflict where her life had just been decided by the fate of that saint she didn't know, Valdrek.
"Come on, don't be pessimistic. There's always something to offer in a negotiation. You can offer me food, the clothes you're wearing, every strand of hair on your head, the nails on your fingers…" A sinister shadow crossed Karla's face, not finding such exchange options disturbing at all. "Some people will even offer their lives in a negotiation in exchange for restoring their honor. What do you say, Tristessa Irandell? Don't you have anything of value in your possession that might interest me?"
"Perdon me, but I don't think that's the case," the mercenary Lufreya quickly replied in her place, having already searched her backpack and removed two items from inside. "Besides supplies, she has a map of the Dominion and this old hunting knife. What say you, Madam Luchie?"
Reiden took the task of taking the leather-sheathed knife from Lufreya and handed it to his boss, who unsheathed it and examined it closely.
"It appears to be from the pre-Imperial era. It might be a valuable item for a certain type of person, yes… But I don't see it being that way for our dear guest." Tristessa noticed Karla looking at her, analyzing her reaction, and easily noticing that the blade only brought back bad memories for its thief. "That being the case, I'm not interested."
Madame Luchie returned the hunting weapon to Reiden and took another drag on her pipe.
"Well, Tristessa Irandell? Are you going to offer something, or will I have to let my mercenaries rip your head off?"
"NO! Wait, I-I…!" Tristessa's eyes widened as she remembered something. A small object that was supposed to be inside that backpack Lufreya had at her feet. "Let me see!"
An almost suicidal act, lunging at that backpack while in such a delicate position. If Madame Luchie hadn't raised her hand to stop the mercenaries, Tristessa would have already been stabbed in the chest by the Dom's flamberge. Ignoring the threatened state she was in, she rummaged through the paper-wrapped strips of meat to find the object hidden in one of the backpack's corners.
"Here!"
Smiling as if in a monumental victory, she handed the mercenary leader the shining spherical jewel that had come to her by pure chance.
"A soul-jewel?" Raiden said, raising an eyebrow.
"So that's one of those jewels I've heard so much about. The standard currency in this world," Tristessa thought, watching as her captor, steadfast in his actions, went to Madame Luchie to hand it over. The old woman didn't seem to share her unwanted guest's excitement.
"And why do you think you can buy your innocence with a SJ?" she asked, crushing Tristessa's hopes like a battering ram against a door.
"Isn't it valuable? I thought… A four-legged gray bird vomited it up at my feet, and it made me feel a little lucky."
"What do you mean? A bird of…?" Karla sniffed the jewel and wrinkled her nose in disgust. "A Farross? You mean a Farross regurgitated a soul-jewel for you?"
An awkward silence briefly existed, only to be broken by the old woman's shrill, spontaneous laughter.
"A soul-jewel found in the least expected place is a clear sign that the Saint of Fortune is lending you a helping hand!" Karla celebrated, tossing the jewel across the fire, nearly making Tristessa fall on her ass in her eagerness to capture it in midair. "Keep it, it's yours. Valdrek smiled at you, Tristessa Irandell; you have offered me a sign of the influence of the angel I worship, and therefore the negotiation has turned out in your favor: in my eyes, you are not a witch of the Coven."
Guided by their employer's judgment, the mercenaries sheathed their weapons and settled back into their seats, more than eager to continue with their nocturnal meal. Reiden was the only exception, who simply crossed his arms and continued watching over the stunned girl, who seemed unaware that she no longer had anything to fear from that traveling merchant's group.
It was as if a small weight had been lifted from her shoulders. She let out a sigh of joy, and a beautiful smile spread across her face as she looked at that faintly shining jewel; that jewel that had just saved her life.
"Finally... A little luck," she thought, before stuffing the soul-jewel into one of the inside pockets of her trench-coat. In that movement, her fingers brushed the surface of her chest where his Baptism in Ruins resided: the supernatural cold remained there, patient, along with the feeling that something bad was going to happen while at the mercy of the Darkness. "...I hope I'm wrong."
"Come and sit down, silly girl." Distracting her, from the perimeter of the campfire, Dom held a clay plate full with a steaming stew that smelled quite good, and was offering it to her. "If you don't eat dinner before you go to sleep, you'll have nightmares."