Eres and his companions sat around a table in the Lanced Wyvern, and Myla seemed to finally have stopped vibrating with excitement. She had barely said a word the whole way back, instead just mumbling to herself and making motions with her hands. Freya had picked up their winnings from the Judge, and been informed that Gap-tooth and his friends would have five days to wrap up any prior business before they left Manneck to find another Guildhall to drink at.

  The pouch of coin sat in front of Myla, and she had only just started concentrating enough to realise what it was, and she fixed Freya with a stern glare. “Why is it going to me? It should be party money, we can all use it.”

  Freya shook her head and laughed. “It’s going to you cause you are the one who fought. Nothing simpler than that. If you want to spend it like it's everyone’s money, that’s up to you, but it’s your coin.”

  “Don’t look over here,” Eres said, preempting Myla’s shy attempt at puppy dog eyes. “I agree with her, you kicked ass in there. We both know you could have ended it with that first cut, but you started off proving a point, and then you were trying to learn something.

  “Speaking of which, you said something about your Spirit Art? I know the basics, hell I seem to be working on my own, judging by that encounter with briar wolves, but what about yours?”

  “Well, it was something Brom told me about,” Myla said, cheeks a little flushed once again. Eres kept finding himself nearly having whiplash between the calm confidence, bordering on cockiness, she displayed whenever they were fighting and her normal shy and flustered demanour. “Berserker Blessings aren’t common, but apparently they are a little more common up in the mountains, and they have found some Spirit Arts that work well for them. Brom started teaching me a little about how to pull Spirit out of the Well inside myself, but I could never work out how to get it to actually do what I wanted it to, you know?”

  “And you think you worked it out?” Freya said, eyebrow raised. “Spirit Arts have a bunch of techniques, right? So you worked out what you need to start learning them?”

  “Yes!” Myla smiled, barely managing to keep her voice down. “The Spirit Arts that Brom mentioned involved using blood to strengthen yourself. I figured, if I am going to be upfront a lot, then I’m going to be getting covered in blood, so it seemed like the one to go with. In the fight today, though, I realised there is more than one piece.

  “It needs my blood too. The Spirit I had roused was just swirling around inside me, but once he cut me, it was like it had a way out. After that, it was like every time I made him blade it made me stronger, faster, better.”

  Eres watched her for a minute, thinking it through. Brom hadn’t ever steered him wrong, and as much as he didn’t like the thought of her getting hurt, if it made her stronger and better able to survive on the front line, then it was only a good thing.

  “What’s the catch?” Eres said, frowning slightly. He remembered how he felt after his Spirit moved him, and the catch was his body nearly ripping itself in two. He was sure he could learn to control it, but he was sure something this powerful had some sort of balance. “Mana and Divinity need to be drawn in to replenish, and they take time to channel, and if you use too much, then the exhaustion is debilitating. Spirit Arts aren’t exactly uniform, but I’m sure they all have some sort of catch; the body can’t just keep going. Did Brom mention it?”

  Myla creased her brows as she let out a huff of air. “Yeah, yeah he did mention it,” she murmured, staring at her hands. “It’s pretty simple. The Spirit Art is called Blood-Drunk. You need to constantly stay in control, ‘cause if you don’t, it can get away from you. It’s like getting tunnel vision, it stops you from realising how hurt you are, and you will keep fighting until you bleed out.

  “I felt it in that fight, as soon as I started, I knew I could kill him at any point, and I had to fight myself not to.”

  “Huh,” Freya said, surprise colouring her voice. “That isn’t too bad, really.”

  Eres and Myla both turned to her in confusion. “I mean, if anyone can deal with that, it would be Myla,” Freya explained, shrugging her shoulders. “She’s about as responsible as anyone I have ever met, and as long as we are around to snap her out of it, then I doubt it would cause any real harm. Just the fact that we know about it means we can try and keep an eye on it. Sure, it might be a risk, but the benefits seem to outweigh it as long as she isn’t fighting alone.”

  Eres smiled, reached over and ruffled Freya’s hair with one hand. “You are right, love,” he laughed, then turned to Myla. “Once we get our armour, we should go find somewhere to practice it, so you can see how much you can gain and how much control you lose. Sound good?”

  Myla nodded and smiled shyly.

  Stolen story; please report.

  “Ah, while I have you both, that reminds me. I got you gifts today,” he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out two small bundles of paper. He saw Freya’s wide eyes and had to stop himself from laughing.

  Truthfully it had been more luck than anything that led him to seeing a gift that he thought Myla would like as they headed back to the inn. He knew he hadn’t been particularly inventive with their presents, but he hoped it conveyed his gratitude and feelings at least. He slid them across the table in front of each of them and gestured towards the bundles.

  Freya went first, her fingers making quick work of the tissue paper wrapping, revealing the pendant and its Opal held in a net of fine silver. It looked to Eres as if someone had imagined catching the moon and tried to craft it into jewellery. She held it up in the light of the window, and Eres saw her eyes get a little misty.

  “You fuck,” she finally choked out, the huge smile on her face taking the sting out of her words. “You got there before I could go back. I knew you were up to something but… Fucker. Thank you, love.”

  Eres just smiled at her. He had been sure she knew he was the one who bought it, but evidentally not. He turned his gaze over to Myla who was still toying with the edge of the paper wrapping uncertainly.

  “Eres, um, I don’t-” she tried to say, but Freya interrupted her before Eres could.

  “You fought for his honor, right? A gift is the least he could do!” she laughed with a wink at her blonde friend, her previous emotional state seemingly back in check. “Let’s see if he did as well for you as he did for me!”

  Myla chewed on her lip hard enough that Eres was worried she might tear it, but she eventually started slowly unwrapping the paper, revealing a pair of earrings on top of a small cloth pouch. They weren't symmetrical, instead, one looked to be a depiction of a sword very similar to the one he had made for her before her fight earlier, and from the other hung a small round shield. Both were incredibly detailed and crafted from pure silver.

  After a moment of silence, Eres’ nervousness couldn’t handle it anymore, and he started rambling. “I saw them on the way back, and it seemed perfect. The Greatsword, well we actually called it a Claymore where I used to come from, I guess, I figured that would be a good reminder of your victory today and how you defended both of us from assholes, and beat them easily because that is just how good you are. The shield is because of your role. I know you don’t use one or anything, but you know, you are always in front of us, shielding us from danger. I just wanted to get you something that let you know how important you are to us, to me, and it seemed like the right thing. I’m sorry if it isn’t-”

  “Eres,” Myla interrupted softly, her hand reaching out to grip his, a gentle smile settling on her face. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

  Eres found himself blushing at her gratitude, but managed to nod and smile.

  “Oh! That reminds me, we got something for you!” Freya started rifling through the bag at her feet, throwing more than a few random bits of junk onto the table before she pulled out a leather wrap and slid it across the table to him. “I noticed you sketching some of these sometimes, and I know you were talking about it with Brom, so I figured you would know what to do with these.”

  Eres reached across the table and undid the strap on the case, unrolling the soft leather. He could smell the oil that had been used to treat the leather, along with some sort of wood smoke that must have got into the material while it was at the market. He found it instantly pleasant, but when he finished unrolling the wrap, he stopped caring about the smell at all.

  Inside the case were four small pots of colour pigments, set into moulded leather. Next to them were what looked like a collection of metal pens, but rather than nibs at the end they each had a different thickness of needle at the end. He could see the notches in the side that would let him remove and clean the needles, as well as smaller pockets in the leather to be filled with all sorts of smaller needles and other supplies.

  “You got me tattooing supplies,” Eres mumbled out, fighting to keep the emotion from smothering his voice. He had mentioned it to Brom maybe once, and the older man had confirmed that with the right training, one could insert Mana into a tattoo just like they could into an enchanted item. Eres had spent a lot of time researching the theory and practicing with random needles he could pull together over the years, but he hadn’t ever been able to really dive into his interest in it without the supplies. He hadn’t expected either of them to remember his interest in it, let alone get him a full set of supplies to start experimenting with it. “I don’t even know what to say.”

  “It’s no big deal,” Myla said, unable to meet his eyes again. “We just saw it in the market and remembered you mentioned it and figured it would make you happy.”

  Eres barked a laugh at that, unable to contain it. “Of course it is a big deal, hon. You guys both remembered something I said maybe once or twice over all the years I have known you, saw that I was still working on it even if I wasn’t talking about it, and decided to make it a reality for me. In what world is that anything other than amazing?”

  Myla kept her eyes turned towards the table, but her face was rapidly approaching the colour of a tomato, so Eres turned across to Freya, who was just smiling at him, eyes sparkling.

  “Glad we got a good gift for you as well. Come on, lets got and drop off everything we bought in the rooms and then go and have some lunch,” Freya said, standing and grabbing both of their hands and pulling them to their feet. “Plus, we need to sew that cut-up, Myla. Your skin might have repaired once you got off the sands, but your shirt didn’t!”

  They took a second to gather their things and head towards their rooms, and as they did, Freya leaned in close to whisper in Eres’ ear before darting up the stairs ahead of him. “Don’t worry, I will make sure you thank me a lot for the gift tonight, love.”

  Eres managed not to stumble on the stairs, but as he went up them, shaking his head, he wondered if he knew what he was getting himself into, and not for the last time.