Chapter 16: Fifteen

You really want to visit the fleshcrafter person. It sounds like they could make Abigail better and that’s the most important thing. Maybe. You’re not sure how or why she’s making the bad sounds, or why they’re bad.

Then again, finding out why shouldn’t be too hard.

You bring a hand way up and touch Abigail’s cheek. It’s very soft and warm, good for snuggling, as is right and proper. “What were those noises?” you ask.

Abigail makes another noise with her nose, a sort of sniffly sound that you also don’t like, then she puts on a smile. It’s a bad smile, her lips moving up in the corners but her eyes are still sad. “It’s nothing,” she says.

You shake your head. You’re the elder here, you’ll be the one to decide if it’s nothing or not, and you decided that it’s something. Unfortunately, it’s not the kind of thing that you can crush with your tentacles or nibble at until it’s gone. “You’re making sad noises. I want to know why so it doesn’t happen again.”

Abigail’s smile becomes more real. “It’s just... I’m worried. You do things that aren’t... right, and it might get you in trouble. The inquisition... it might be trouble and I’m afraid that you’ll be hurt.”

“That’s silly,” you say. “I’m unhurtable.” At least, nothing you’ve seen these mortals do could hurt you.

“But they might try to hurt you, and that would hurt me,” she says.

You’d nibble their souls apart long before they hurt Abigail! No one’s going to make your cuddle provider sad except for you. And if you do it’s all an accident. “Fine then. You need to tell me the stuff that I shouldn’t do so that I don’t do them.” You frown a little. “And tell me about the Inquisition. You talk about it as if it’s scary. Scarier than me.”

Abigail makes another sound, but this time it’s happier. She grabs you by the shoulders and squishes your face against her chest while patting the back of your head. Mission success!

When the hugging ends, Abigail holds you by the shoulders and takes a deep breath. “The Inquisition are important. They’re the ones that secure copy rights on any magic circles that mages invent and who make sure royalties are paid. That’s not all they do. They also make sure that there are no cults and things like that.”

“Cults?” you ask.

Abigail nods then hugs you again. You’re not sure why, but you won’t say no to more hugs. “Cults are bad,” she tells you. “They worshipped all sorts of things, false gods and evil prophecies and things like that, but the Inquisition came in and disproved everything and broke up all the religions. Since gods aren’t real, religion can’t be right, so stuff like that is illegal here, and in most places where the Inquisition reaches. They used all the gold and stuff they got to build big schools like the Academy.”

You’re not sure how you feel about this. On the one tentacle, the only god-like thing these mortals should be worshipping is you. There should be statues of your tentacular glory all over and they should sacrifice valuable time to pat-patting you on the head. On the other tentacle, now the others like you (but probably not as pretty or as awesome) don’t have a foothold in the mortal world to steal your precious pat-pats.

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“Okay,” you say. “Then I’ll be sure to not annoy them too much unless they annoy me first.”

Abigail makes another choking noise and your attention snaps back to her. “I think just being who you are would annoy them, Dreamer.”

“You’re making bad sounds again,” you tell her. “Do I need to put back all the things I took to fix it?”

Abigail stands a little taller and looks back towards the street. The wall she was almost leaning against it the same one for the shop she bought her things at. “I guess we should. But I’m not sure how we’ll explain you taking the things out of the displays.”

You shrug. ”I’ll just copy all the things first, so that you can have some too.” It takes only a passing thought to spin the stuff you’re holding in just the right way for them to split apart. Then you take all of the originals and toss them onto a pile of skirts that you use to grab onto the whole lot without needing a dozen tentacles.

“What do you mean, copy?” Abigail asks.

You don’t have time to answer.

A hole is shred into reality a few feet above your head and Abigail eeps as she stumbles back. That’s good, because now she’s outside of the splash radius.

With a grunt of effort, you push your tentacle through the rip in reality and right into and past the shop’s brick wall.

Having a tentacle the size of a small tree pierce through a wall is surprisingly loud, you discover as both you and Abigail shield your head from flying bits of masonry.

“Oops?” you say before letting go of the stuff your tentacle is holding onto. You might have dropped them on one of those glass displays, judging by all the glass-breaking noises.

Your tentacle slithers sheepishly back into the hole in reality and closed it on the way back.

“Oh no,” Abigail breathes. She grabs your hand and starts dragging you along. “We-we need to run,” she says.

“Oh, okay.”

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