Chapter 3: 3: Aeiaei The Dullahan, Headless Enigma

After lunch, as well as a brief physical exam, Ryder was temporarily discharged from Bellatrix's titillatingly intimate care. This was partly because she didn’t want to waste time in bed, partly because that bed was needed for someone else. Additionally, one of the demonic servants, a shortstack goblin maid that was on cleaning duty in the room Ryder was staying in suggested that Demon Queen Lilith was ready to have a little chat with the summoned yakuza. The bedridden patient needed crutches to move about, so a pair was provided.

Ryder was granted privileges to freely navigate the halls of the castle, although exploring it was hardly in her plans, still being beat up from two nights prior. Touring the wide and beautifully adorned halls outside the guest room, it was easy enough to find the way to the master bedroom. Clumsily stumbling along wide spiraling stairways and passing by busy servants carrying bandages and all about the castle, she finally reached the monarch wing, huffing and puffing along the way.

As is customary for castles and opulent mansions, the master bedroom was adjacent to a lounge of sorts, as well as a personal office slash library. Either traversing the corridors, or entering the lounge and observing the interior, Ryder failed to discover anything that “monstrous” or “demonic”. Aside from the doors being a little larger that usual to accommodate taller races, the furnishings looked like a standard gothic spin on utilitarian medieval Europe mansion decorum. Finding a large bedroom double-door, adorned with an abstract voluminous mural made out of red wood, Ryder gave it a gentle love tap with her one healthy leg.

~THUD~

“Hey Lilith! I’m here, although I’m still too beat up to take you up on that sexy arrangement we had.“

Hearing some shuffling and things falling over on the other side of the door, a tired yet soothing voice responds.

Either she just woke up, or the little goat snoozed her way past noon.

“Ah, sorry! Um, I’ll get dressed here in a second, please wait in the lobby. General Aeiaei should be there shortly to keep you company.“

Oh, that’s a name I’m hearing for the second time today, Ryder was elated to greet another general of war. Not to mention, lamia healer Bellatrix indirectly suggested that the summoning ritual was Aeiaei’s idea. A million questions filled her head. Just then, with a loud booming sound, the office’s doors were swung open. There was a horrifying silhouette at the door. A headless horseman, no horse in sight, stood in the door frame, holding onto their head with one hand. With the scary scraps of armor to match, Ryder saw such characters only in picture books. It was, quite honestly, hard not to jump at the scare. The figure, however, began speaking, defying the laws of logic - as one needs air inside the lungs to do so. Or so Ryder assumed.

“In the fullness of time, the interplanar pilgrim elected to materialize, awakening from med-stasis after barely a tandem of solar revolutions. The progeny for the vast cosmos of occurrence known as Ryder, we welcome thee, to our monarch’s quarters.“

A loud, echoey, dramatic to an extreme voice filled the dimly lit lounge, disturbing the candle light around it. The person, that is to say, the head that was speaking belonged to a young woman - pale as ghost, with glowing, searing eyes that didn’t have pupils. Her gaze quite literally looked as if two bright light bulbs were installed where her sockets are, illuminating whatever she was looking at. She had short, pitch-black hair, in a sort-of ‘punk’ asymmetric haircut with shaved temples. Her body was well-endowed, clearly forged in many battles - with multiple scars on her exposed shoulders and abs. What interested Ryder more was her neck, which stopped at mid-point, like it was cut by a guillotine. Furthermore, that neck wound had a faint blue smoke coming out of it, dissipating in the air above. Not knowing where to look, Ryder decided to address the held head, which presumably knew her name without inquiring about it.

“Um… hello. General Aeiaei, I assume?“, Ryder was taken aback, both by the cryptic riddle-like way of speaking she had to decipher on the fly, as well as having to do it while looking at a detached head that was held like a volleyball under the dullahan’s arm.

“Thine assumptions reign true, much like ours did when we heard you survived. Allow us to anew share our happiness that the healing serpent’s methods restored you to full in such a short span.”

Noticing Ryder’s eyes pacing back and forth, as well as the silence that followed, the headless general explained, “be puzzled no more. We use ‘us’ to refer to ourselves in the singular - lest the body’s agency be undermined - a big slight against our kind. In any such case, have you something to share with her majesty? Great value coequals with her finite time, as you can surmise reigns true for all sovereigns.”

Can’t fool me, I can recognize a voice of someone that overslept.

The dullahan were known as a very mysterious race, even by this world’s standards. And the way this one was speaking was similar to an enigmatic oracle. Having to sift through a lot of different people in her line of work, Ryder was really flexing her linguistic muscles to try to find meaning in her words. Not wanting to make a bad impression, she decided against her usual ‘cut through the bullshit' approach.

“Yes. Little ol' me and your boss Lilith still need to work out the specifics of my contract. As much as I want to help you lot out of the goodness of my heart, my allegiance is my own, and I still have a lot of questions.“ I also kinda want to touch her dragon tail~ that thing was massive, “speaking of questions, they said something about you playing a part in summoning me to this world?“

“You avoided attribution by abusing ‘they’, a most strategic inquest, we must say. Thine inquiries will be answered in due time, cosmic traveler. When seeking awareness of ‘how’, one must first ask themselves the ‘why’, for the particularities they seek out may lead them to a tangled web of mystified knowledge.“

This one’s not prone to speaking their mind without reason, that I can tell. Perhaps that shroud of mystery and crypticism is intentional and she doesn’t trust me yet.

The regally-dressed dullahan suddenly made two steps towards the stupefied crutch-bound yakuza. She then promptly held out her head with two hands, pointing it directly at Ryder’s chest, Aeiaei’s bright eyes illuminating the snuggly tied bandages with warm light.

“What are you doing?”, the yakuza looked down on the pale woman with raised arms. It seems the general was not looking at, but past the bandages that covered her breasts.

“A gaping wound is in thine chest, cosmic voyager. One not healed by the Ouroboros. Ferrous in nature, a shard lodged deep within, asleep but ready to fester if thee are not cautious.“

Ryder, adorned with a strangely blank expression, paused and blinked a couple times.

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Not dealing with that right now, she thought.

Slowly leaning forward, as to gently smother the girl’s head in-between the mounds she was looking at, the yakuza playfully asked, ignoring the warning, “Didn’t dullahan mommy teach you not to x-ray people’s boobies without their consent?“

For a split second, as if bending a stray streak of light, the smoke coming out of the headless horsewoman’s neck turned a vibrant shade of pink, returning to it’s previous azure color just the same after a second. Aeiaei was quick to return the head back to its previous position, the “volleyball in hand“ grip, just as quick.

“We apologize, thine boundaries were overstepped, such will not occur again.“

…

A brief silence followed that guilty yet expressionless apology, interrupted only by barely audible shuffling on the other side of the master bedroom door. Quite interestingly, Aeiaei’s head nor body moved a single inch in that time - not even blinking.

“So uh… you command undead such as yourself… often?“ toting back and forth on her crutches, Ryder decided to break the silence, addressing the general.

Suddenly, a still-sleepy aristocratic voice called out from the just-opened bedroom door, “you want to know how we know your name without asking it, right?“

Lilith, the Demon Queen, a Baphomet-like figure with hooves for legs, wings and a tail was currently standing in the doorway, holding onto a half-empty cup of coffee. Her perfectly symmetrical demonic face was stuck in a “hold on I’m gonna yawn“ expression. A little shaky and slow with her movements, she was stretching her wings past the door frame in a twisting motion, raising her shoulder blades.

“Aa-ahhh“, she yawned sheepishly.

Her goat-like eyes were a little cloudy, with large bags under them showing serious sleep deprivation. Opening the master bedroom door more and inviting the yakuza inside, a clear reason was apparent - stacks on stacks of paper were hoarded all around her private chambers. A multitude of burnt candles and floating magical ink-bottles filled the room.

“Hey, Lilith.” the injured outlaw looked past her and to the room behind “Sure hope you’re busy writing a novel and not trying to run everything on your own in there.“

The expressionless dullahan chose to address the monarch as well, “Once again, we are vehemently opposed to assigning Commander Cerberus on more outlying vocations. Only her diligence in bookkeeping rivals thou. Her lapsed absence affects thine judgement and health grealy.“

“I’m fine, Aei. Thanks for worrying about me. And for your quartermastery, I know you don’t like it.“

With that, Ryder once again saw a pinkish color - less vibrant, but soothing in its warmth coming from the headless horsewoman’s neck. General Aeiaei knelt on one knee, lowering her head and replying, “Our proclivity for certain tasks over others is of no consequence, when thou welfare is on the line. We shall await thine further summons, and leave thee with the progeny for now.“

“Any time, Aei. Dismissed,“ Lilith smiled.

General Aeiaei stood up and proceeded to exit the lounge, which meant the summoned could get a long-awaited chat with her summoner. As demonic as Lilith looked, her demeanor seemed like that of an equal to Ryder.

“Sorry about her, Aeiaei may seem a little inconsiderate at times, but she has good heart.“

Ryder put her crutches to the side and limped towards the double-bed in the middle of the room, plopping down on top of it. The only parts of the room not covered in paper was a single spot on the bed, the dresser, as well as the adjacent balcony. Large ledgers and tomes were placed upon ceiling-high bookshelves along the walls of the royal bedchamber.

Pomf~ This place has a severe lack of decorations. A catana here, an taxidermied animal head there - a proper queen’s landing.

Inhaling the smell of paper, ink and morning coffee - she changed her expression to one of excitement. The woman standing in front of her was the top dog of this organization. Even with an untrained eye Ryder could pick up the scattered numbers on the books she had to deal with, judging from the ink-drawn tables - troops, imports, exports, garrisons, demonic army stop-losses.

“Alright, me from another world, let’s talk shop.“

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