Chapter 10: Nine

RavensDagger

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You wiggle the jar filled with life juice around, the contents stirring with big gloops and glops like pudding with too much milk added in. If pudding glowed and was made of life energy.

You realize that you might be hungry.

Either way, Abigail said that some people took her juices out of her every month as a sort of tax, which means that if you give her this she won’t have to do that, and will therefore be happy with you. And if she’s happy with you, she will give you headpats and cuddles. Not that you want those things, of course.

After a bit of thinking, you realize that the gift doesn’t really come from you. It’s technically the world’s life juice that you sucked out. Abigail might be miffed if she learns that you stole something to give it to her.

Silly summoner and her silly morality.

Getting onto your knees, you pat the ground. “Thank you, little planet. I will cherish your juice,” you say. “But if you tell Abi I will eat you.”

There, now everything is safe.

You rub the dust off your knees, clap your hands together to clean them, then grab your jar again before moving to the front of the shop. Moriarty, that weirdo, is still there. He’s leaning way over the counter, his weight on his elbows as he talks to Abigail. “Oh, my sweet Abigail, you poor thing, working here all day. Tell you what. Next time I’ll send my familiar with an order, and when you come to deliver it, we can spend some... quality time talking in my workshop. I know how interested you are in the finer arts. I’m sure I could teach you plenty.”

Is this man trying to convince Abigail to mate with him? The fool! If she spends time with him, it’ll mean less time with you, which is unforgivable.

You walk up to the man and poke him in the thigh hard enough that he hisses and jumps back. When he looks down, you meet his eyes with your own. “Mine,” you say while pointing right at Abigail. “You will not mate her without my permission, mortal.”

“I what?” he asked. “I was trying to do no such thing,” he says.

“Are you done buying stuff?” you ask.

“I think he was,” Abigail is quick to add. She has a bunch of jars and boxes piled up next to her on the counter, most of them already in a pair of cardboard boxes. She quickly puts the rest of them into a box and shoves it towards Moriarty. “Thank you for shopping at Madam Morigan’s.”

“Yeah, now leave,” you tell him.

“Why, I never! Who is this rude child?” he asks Abigail as if you’re not there.

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He’s the rude one! You reach out with a pair of tentacles and grab his boxes, then wrap your hand around his wrist. He’s sputtering a lot, and staring at your tentacles as if he’s never seen any before as you drag him to the door. “Bye now,” you say as you shove his stuff into his chest and push him out the door.

When you turn around, you find that Abigail is hiding her mouth behind both hands, but the way her eyes are crinkled in the corners suggests that she’s smiling. “You can’t do that, Dreamer,” she says.

“He was rude,” you say.

“Well, yeah, but that’s just Moriarty. He’s always been that way. I think he’s mostly harmless just really full of himself.”

“He wanted to mate with you.”

Abigail might have contracted some filthy mortal sickness because her skin turns very red in the time it takes you to blink twice. “N-no, that’s not, I’m sure you’re wrong.”

Her denial changes nothing. “I obtained a gift for you. I made it myself.” Well, you didn’t make the jar, or the juice, but you put the juice in the jar, so that counts as making something, probably. You walk past a confused and still red Abigail to the back where your glowing jar is still waiting and pick it up. “Here, this will make you better,” you say as you place the jar onto the table.

Abigail looks at it for just a moment before gasping. The redness is gone now, but your silly summoner went too far in the other direction and is now too pale. “Dreamer, no,” she whispers before snatching the jar off the table. She looks towards the door, then grabs you by the hand and drags you into the backstore, jar tucked up against her chest. “Where did you get this?” she asks.

“I made it.”

“Dreamer, this is Aether,” Abigail says as she shakes the jar. “This much... Dreamer, this is more than a person can make in a year. And it looks pure.”

“Yes?” you ask. She’s being very silly.

“This is worth more than gold,” she says. “You, you could buy the shop with this much.”

You fail to see the problem, but Abigail looks scared. She’s shaking, shivering and holding the jar as if it might explode at any moment. “The planet helped a little,” you admit. “But I paid it in pats. Which you’re supposed to do for me since I gave you a gift.”

“The planet?” she repeats.

You nod. “I used a sucky tentacle and pulled the life juice out of the core. It still has lots.”

“I...” Abigail swallows and gently places the jar on a nearby workbench. “Dreamer, first the apartment, now this... what are you?”

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