Jin was relieved to learn that her new assignment wouldn’t require some pervy dress or to be with one of the Speakers. It was still technically a home attendant role, but with one of the Whispers who did alchemical research and wanted someone to dictate her notes.

  “You’ll be working alongside Alim,” Karam explained as they made their way to the new home in the pre-dawn twilight. “He’s nice but can’t hear anything, so talking is a bit pointless. He was born like that, like me, but he’s really smart. Raised as a Whisper before transferring to the Service Sect. Just turned nine recently, so he’s been here for about a year now.”

  “Can he lip-read?” she asked. “I knew some kids that could do that in my world.”

  Karam got an awkward look as he carefully said, “He can a little bit, but you need to have really good enunciation, and well… I’m not sure if he’ll understand your accent.”

  “I guess I’ll find out soon enough,” she said with a shrug. “Anything about this Whisper I need to know about?”

  He grimaced and spoke in barely more than a whisper as he admitted, “Not that I know for sure, but I’ve seen Alim come to dinner with bruises before. When I ask, he just writes that it was an accident in the lab, but I’m not sure that’s all.”

  Jin frowned. “You think she’s hurting him?”

  Karam shrugged. “Not enough that I’m worried for his life or anything like that. I’m only mentioning it in case she does get, um, physical and hopefully doesn’t catch you off guard.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Well, pretty much everyone has heard about Lord Nabil and about you attacking some random people—”

  “Hey! They attacked me first! I was just better than them at defending myself,” she retorted, then glanced around the street, which was already starting to get crowded despite the early hour. “And how did you even hear about that? That was literally yesterday!”

  He chuckled. “You made the mistake of telling Basima. She really loves to talk.”

  “Wonderful. She didn’t happen to keep the whole Fox bit a secret, did she?”

  “You mean how you insulted a god?”

  Jin groaned. “I’m not gonna get extra lashes for that, am I?”

  “No, just don’t insult other people, and you should be fine… I think.”

  “You don’t sound very sure.”

  “Maybe try to avoid punching and kicking too…”

  “You make me sound like some maniac that goes around insulting and attacking people.”

  He didn’t look at her or respond at that time, and as the silence stretched on, she added, “I’m not!”

  Karam chuckled at her assertion and merely said, “Yes, Miss Jin.”

  She wanted to say more but he had stopped at their destination where a young man stood waiting outside the door. He had the same paler complexion as Basima but had short wavy brown hair. Since he wore the same gray tunic and pants as her, she verified with Karam, “This must be Alim, right?”

  “Yeah,” he replied, and waved as Alim glanced over at them.

  Jin waved as well in greeting, and the new boy smiled in response.

  When they got closer, Karam spoke clearly to Alim. “This is Miss Jin. She’s going to help clean and dictate for Lady Shahara.”

  Alim lifted what appeared to be a chalkboard that hung from around his neck and wrote with a finger on it, which instantly clued in Jin that it was some kind of magic item as he turned it to show them the words he wrote, “I know. I got a message last night. Welcome, Jin.”

  “Thanks,” she replied with a dip of her head.

  Alim pressed a small rune on the side of the board, clearing the lettering, before quickly writing out, “Just follow me and I’ll show where everything is.” Then he cleared that and wrote for Karam, “We’re both done at dinnertime if you want to eat together.”

  Karam nodded and gave him a little bow and a hand gesture of thanks. Then he turned to remind her, “I’ll be back for you and Alim at dinnertime then. Try not to attack Lady Shahara.”

  “Ha. Ha. You are hilarious,” she retorted, but he smiled at her and waved as he left.

  She turned back to Alim, who tilted his head towards the door and gestured for her to follow him inside. This home was very different from the lord’s mansion. Aside from being much smaller, it was also extremely cluttered. It wasn’t dirty, she noticed, but there were items stored everywhere—mostly of the alchemical variety.

  “Wow, this must be a nightmare to clean,” she said before remembering that Alim couldn’t hear her. She shrugged, though; it wasn’t important enough to bother him with her musings.

  For his part, Alim showed her the handful of rooms that were all pretty self-explanatory in their purpose and she discovered the main room they would be in was the little lab the researcher worked in. She was currently in that lab but was hunched over a table, drooling while she slept.

  Alim gave a heavy sigh and wrote on his little board to tell Jin, “She always works too much. Falls asleep in the middle of it. Try not to wake her while we clean around her; she always makes a mess when I’m gone.”

  Jin nodded, wishing she had her own little board to communicate better herself.

  They worked silently. Alim showed her where anything went that wasn’t immediately obvious to her as they took empty but dirty potion beakers and vials to the small sink in the corner and swept up spilled ingredients.

  “Who are you?” a voice echoed through the room, and Jin jumped in surprise, almost dropping the pile of dried leaves that she had been collecting from the floor.

  She turned to Shahara and said, “I’m Jin. The new Servant that can dictate for you?”

  “Finally,” the Whisper said. “I’ve been asking for someone for weeks now. Grab that book over there and a stool, and come sit.”

  Jin did as instructed, shaking her head at Alim’s curious look. However, he seemed to realize what was happening a few moments later and returned to cleaning. Lady Shahara turned out to be a very driven researcher and actually did fairly well teaching her a few things. Jin started to wonder if it really was just accidents that caused Alim to get injured before, since the Whisper barely paid any attention to him while telling Jin what to write down in the notebook.

  “I think for this next try, I’m going to attempt infusing a bit of Earth magic into it with—” The researcher looked around the large table, searching for something as she said to herself in frustration, “Wait, where is it? I know I had some crimstone powder in a jar here… Alim!” She yelled over at the man who was currently scrubbing the dirty vials in the corner sink.

  Jin was about to go over to get his attention when the Whisper picked up a chunk of stone that had been sitting on the table and threw it at him, causing him to yelp and jump in surprise.

  Alim glanced back at them both and blushed a bright red when his eyes met Jin’s. He bowed his head as he picked up the rock and rushed over to Shahara while trying to dry his hands on a towel.

  The researcher extremely loudly and slowly said, “WHERE… IS… THE… CRIMSTONE?!”

  Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

  He nodded and quickly moved over to the far wall to retrieve a jar off a shelf and bring it to her.

  Shahara didn’t thank him as she swiped the jar and held it up so that Jin could see the sparkling red powder. “This should do the trick. Make sure to note how much I use for this, okay?”

  Jin numbly nodded, understanding now how Alim had gotten bruised before since both of them had seemed like nothing out of the ordinary had happened. It turned out that the rock wasn’t the only thing Shahara would throw to get Alim’s attention, usually just grabbing whatever large item was on hand and chucking it across the room.

  “I can go retrieve the things you need if you want to; just let Alim focus on cleaning,” Jin offered, but the woman waved a dismissive hand.

  “Maybe eventually, but it will take you a while to learn what everything is and where that foolish boy keeps hiding it. I swear he moves things just so I can’t get rid of him. ‘Job security,’ I think it’s called. He knows that without me putting up with him, he’d be thrown in the Tower by now or turned into some pervert’s plaything. Disgusting what some people will stoop to.”

  “Tell me about it,” Jin mumbled, actually agreeing with that last part. However, she didn’t agree with the idea that Alim was foolish or doing anything malicious; it just seemed like the researcher was a scatterbrain that couldn’t keep track of her shit.

  It was at lunch time when she and Alim got to be alone as Shahara left the house to go get food from a place she frequented for her meals instead of having either of them attempt to cook. Alim showed her to the place he would go to instead. As they sat at a small table in an open pavilion area surrounded by different food vendors, Jin finally asked him, “Are you okay?”

  Alim tilted his head at her and wrote on his tablet, “What do you mean?”

  She tried to speak slowly to enunciate the foreign-sounding words that her Talent apparently let her know instinctively as she quietly clarified, “She threw a lot of heavy things at you. Are you hurt?”

  His face reddened again as he looked down and wrote, “I’m fine. Don’t worry about it. Just do as she asks. Don’t make her mad, and you’ll be fine.”

  Jin frowned but nodded. Then he started asking her questions on the little board that she answered as best as she could. “Where are you from? What do you like doing? Do you have any cool Talents?”

  In return, he answered those same questions for her. “I used to be a Whisper, but even those they don’t want to talk need to hear the whispers of others. I really do like alchemy, which has been the bright side of working for Shahara. I have one cool Talent; it gives me more mana than normal, and I won’t get sick from too much mana as fast.”

  “Oh, cool, mana’s a thing here. Can you cast spells or something?”

  “I know some Mundane cantrips I can show you if we get back before Shahara does. There’s a wand there she’ll let me use sometimes for certain tasks.”

  “Uh, yes, please,” Jin replied, finally feeling excited about something this world had to offer. “Even wand magic would be awesome to learn. Does all magic require wands here?”

  “Just cantrips require a medium like a wand or staff. Rituals and enchantments require a lot of other various ingredients. Then some Caster abilities might require either a medium or ingredients, but most don’t.”

  “Interesting. We should get going then if you’re gonna show me,” she said, really hoping they had enough time as she scarfed down the rest of her food.

  Alim’s laugh was soft and whispery, but Jin couldn’t help thinking it sounded adorable, and she found herself hoping to make him laugh more since it was the only sound she had heard him make aside from the yelps of pain.

  Jin was excited to find the house empty when they returned, and Alim showed her back to the lab, where he retrieved a small rectangular box that held a crystalline wand inside. He smiled at her as he held it near the sink, and he focused on it for a moment. She saw his mouth move as if speaking, but no sound came out. Then, a small gout of flames erupted from the tip of the wand before quickly dissipating.

  “Woah, that’s awesome,” she said in awe at the overt display of magic.

  “It’s just a Mundane cantrip to help light a campfire,” he wrote on his board while blushing in embarrassment.

  “There’s nothing mundane about it, in my opinion,” she replied. “My world didn’t have any magic at all, so even this is just blowing my mind right now.”

  “Do you want to try it?”

  Jin stared at him with wide eyes. “Can I? Like, is it even possible for me?”

  He nodded. “Yes, you just need to know the incantation and picture your intent. The wand will pull the mana from you to fuel it.”

  Then he wrote down the incantation for her, but before she could try it, Jin heard the front door open. Alim quickly put the wand back in the box but set that above the sink instead for later. For now, they needed to get back to work.

  It was almost the end of the day, and Jin was starting to feel good about the idea of working here when she realized with sudden dismay that there was no way she could.

  “Tiger’s damn stripes, to the Abyss with this!” Shahara yelled in frustration as she grabbed the potion vial that had just turned a sickly orange color. She angrily stomped over to Alim, who was quietly reordering some of the notebooks that had been spread around earlier and putting them back where they belonged.

  He didn’t notice her until she grabbed him by the tunic and spun him around and held the vial up into his face. “I told you to bring fresh hildenleaves! Does this look fresh to you!”

  Jin knew there was no way Alim could read her lips as she half shook him and that the woman hadn’t said anything about the freshness of any of the ingredients she had listed earlier, but that didn’t seem to stop the Whisper from ranting at him. “You useless Servant!” she yelled, then made Jin start as she threw the vial on the floor at his feet to shatter.

  Then Shahara hit him.

  Over and over again, she whaled on him as she spewed curses and blamed him for all her failures.

  Alim merely lifted his arms to shield his face and tried to make himself appear small despite being a few inches taller than both Jin and Shahara were.

  Jin moved to stop her. Somebody had to stop her from hurting him.

  Shahara shoved her off, and Alim surprised Jin by making a hand motion that Jin recognized as the same sign language that the Whisper Alaina had used with Petal. Alim practically yelled with his hands, “Stop! Don’t fight! She gets worse!”

  The researcher shouted at Jin, “Stay off, girl. He deserves this punishment for ruining my experiment and wasting my time!”

  When Shahara turned back to slam a fist into Alim’s eye, Jin knew she was going to get in trouble again.

  She moved to the box with the wand stashed by the sink and grabbed it as she pointed it at the abusive woman. She noticed another odd holographic display appear above her hand, but she didn’t have time to read it as she recited the incantation she had been repeating in her mind ever since reading it. “By the fiery mane of the Horse, burn with the passion of the sun!”

  Flames spewed forth as Jin felt the odd tingling sensation of mana getting pulled from her. Not only Shahara’s hair caught fire but also the extensive amount of paper contained in the bookshelf behind her.

  As the researcher screamed, Jin grabbed Alim’s hand and ran. She was so going to get more lashes for this.

  “Did she seriously just use Horse’s spell to burn down that Whisper’s home?” Lion asked as he languidly laid upon his throne atop the Tower of Polarity with the other gods lounging nearby.

  “Aren’t you just proud of her?” Cat asked. “I, for one, am loving her dominant streak. She is a terrible choice for a Servant.” Then Cat said in a patronizing voice to the yellow labrador that was practically cuddling with it, “Isn’t that right, dumb Dog?”

  “Yes, Mistress Cat,” the canine deity replied, giving the feline a cleaning lick behind the ear.

  “Good Dog.”

  “She has more courage than most Servants as well,” Eagle said from their perch within one of the trees, which provided shade to their sacred meeting place. “She may yet survive the Tower.”

  “She may survive the Day of Death, but she will not leave it,” Swan sadly said from her little pond. “There will be many tears tomorrow.”

  “Sure, but think of all the fun everyone will have, too!” Fox said as the tiny deity jumped up on the dais throne to bat at Lion’s tail. “The crowds will all be betting and cheering on their favorites! Just imagine how much excitement there will be with not just a Wayfarer but a Servant making it past the first floor!”

  Horse shook their fiery mane and stomped at the ground with a hoof. “She has no drive. No passion to reach the top. She may not be easily ordered, but she seems to want for nothing. Has nothing to spur her forward! She will not pass the first floor.”

  “Want to make a bet?” Rabbit asked, hopping over and up onto Horse’s back. “I think she’ll at least pass the first floor, but I bet she can reach the top. We still don’t know what her mysterious Talents might be.”

  “You’re also assuming she’s going to get picked by Salman,” Owl spoke up from nearby Eagle. “The humans don’t always make the wise choice. He may choose another.”

  “He will choose her,” Cat said with determination. “He always chooses the ones who cause him the biggest headache. After she just burned down that Whisper’s home, we’ll be lucky if he doesn’t just toss her into the Tower before the gates open.”

  “What do you think Butterfly,” Owl asked the quiet god who was slowly hovering nearby. “Is this Wayfarer going to change how the Season will go?”

  The deity didn’t answer right away but eventually said in a tiny, tinkling voice, “Wayfarers always bring change. Jin will be no different in that regard. Hopefully, it is a change we will prefer.”