Fiends and Fighters

Mama and Papa told me stories, growing up, of their adventures. They told all of us village kids stories. You should hear the impressions Papa does! And he would add twinkling lights and puffs of smoke at the dramatic parts. When I got older I learned how to add the special effects myself. I'd help him tell the stories to the younger kids, but… I think we both knew I still wanted to hear them myself, too. We never stop loving stories, y'know? We all need a little magic.
For a while, though—the stories were just for me. I couldn't play outside with the other kids. I had to hide in my room when the Guild came over. Papa claimed they were just doing boring adult stuff, taxes and ledgers. Mama said they put a magical seal around the room, and if I broke it by coming downstairs then a demon could pop through and eat me up. Really weird combination of excuses. Weirdly effective, though. But once I was a little older… I started to wonder if maybe I was the secret.
I mean, I don't remember a time when my parents weren't proud of me. They told me every single day how much they loved me, how much they'd prayed for me, how special I was. They didn't—I mean, they didn't completely spoil me. You kind of can't do that in a place like Drakesland Wharf. Nobody gets everything they want, we all have to contribute… but I was their miracle, they said. I was their greatest reward.
But once I was six or seven, I started to ask why I couldn't go out to the village, and they couldn't conjure up any more excuses. So Mama sat me down and told me the story—the whole story this time. She told me that they'd fought demons and devils for so many years, and had been so close to the Negative Planes, that it had changed them—permanently altered the energy around them. They tried for ages to have me… and when they did, I had—Mama called it the Mark of the Fiend. It's why I looked different from them. You know—horns, purple, tail. She told me it was a mark of pride—a sign that I was descended from warriors who fought evil all their lives, and someday I would fight evil too.
They let me get used to that idea for a couple days. The Mark of the Fiend. I liked it! I still think it's a better name than tiefling. Then Mama and Papa sat me down again—both of them this time. They said that I was old enough to meet the Guild, if I wanted to… but I had to understand that they might think the Mark of the Fiend was something different. Not every warrior gets it, and some of the people who don't think it's a sign of evil. But as far as they were concerned, Mama and Papa said, anyone who didn't see how special I was—like they did—wasn't worthy of calling themselves a warrior.
So the next Guild meeting, I told Mama and Papa I wanted to meet the Guild. The heroes from my stories? Of course I wanted to meet them right away! I wore my best dress, I waited at the top of the stairs like it was New Year's Dawn, until Mama and Papa let me come down to the main room.
It was… not the welcome I expected. I saw this long, long table of legendary warriors—there were easily twenty, twenty-five of them back then? I don't remember. Whatever, abjurers can't count. But the table went on forever, and every single one of them was staring at tiny, tiny me. There was a long silence. My little heart sank. And then a huge fight broke out. Papa was trying to calm everyone down… swear to the gods Mama had her hand on her axe, ready to swing. It was Faedor who was the first one to show me any kindness. They glided over to me, got on their knees, and gave me a huge hug. I'll always remember that. Mikhail was one of the ones in shock, I think—but the next day he came over with his family and introduced them to me. Sasha was my first friend.
So there were arguments, of course, over the next few days. Mama and Papa sent me out with Pops and Sasha on the boat, just so I wouldn't have to hear—you know—all of their colleagues argue to the brink of violence over whether I was an evil spirit or a seven-year-old girl. Super messed up, right? But Mama and Papa had their allies, and wouldn't hear a word against me. And even though these were decades-long comrades, people who'd literally saved their lives, they cut them off completely if they couldn't handle having a tiefling kid around.
The hardest one to deal with, Mama says, was Lady Vera. She was the Champion of the Two Daughters, famous along the realm, good and true—and one of Mama and Papa's closest companions. She saved their lives countless times. But when she saw me… she froze. She looked away, straight ahead, like she was ignoring something… embarrassing? Embarrassing, I guess. Shameful.
Ann says she and Father Trulove fought a lot when she was little, but never more than that night. I don't know if I said—sorry—that was her mom. Lady Vera Trulove. The next morning, the house was just as she had left it, except… Lady Vera was gone. Left her sword, her medals—left everything. Father Trulove was kind enough to me, but I didn't meet Ann for… some years. We're still not that close.
So just like that—Fiend's Bane was half its size. Mama and Papa swore that it wasn't because I was bad—it was because the others had stopped understanding that good lives not in the form, but in the soul. Still… they had hushed arguments sometimes at night, when they thought I couldn't hear. Losing that many was hard. They cut back the scope of their expeditions to the Kingdoms. A few of the older members died, and the Guild stopped exploring almost entirely. Just enough to keep our little patch of the plane safe, and solve the problems of the few fiend-bound souls who remembered us and came seeking aid. Someday they'd add more members, they said. Papa added it onto the end of his stories—I was too old for bedtime stories, but by the gods he told them anyway. If they just *hold on* a little longer, keep their skills up, wait for the right people—it could be an army to rival the forces of the Hells.
Of course I wanted to be part of it! I'd wanted to forever. Mama said I was descended from warriors, right? I played Fiends and Fighters in the woods with the neighborhood children, once I got to meet them. I read everything I could get my hands on—Faedor brought me any books on arcana and history he could sneak out from the school library. (According to them, "you don't owe fines when you're 500 years old and look this good, dear, so you can keep those.") Mama and Papa made me promise I'd do at least four years of school before adventuring—Mama wanted me to do the full seven. I'm two semesters away, but I mean—I HAD to go now! I just had to. With—with Shadow on the rise, and everyone here together, and Trulove going quite honestly a little bit impshit-crazy… it was right.
But… ugh, I feel awful even saying this, but I've got to get it out there. I've been lying to Mama and Papa. They think I lost track of time at Mack's and had to run to catch the WUAK boats as they left. I mean, I didn't need anything from home. All my stuff's either with me or back in my dorm. My roommate knows the story, kind of, and I think they'll make sure everything's okay with our professors. But that's what you heard me talking to myself, back on the deck. I still have their Sending Stone and I'm… I'm just feeding them comforting lies. Classes are hard this semester but I'm doing well, yes I'm making friends, yes I'm getting my sleep, no I'm not forgetting to eat.
Fiend's Bane—well, old-school Fiend's Bane—are trying to organize a response team to "find those scoundrels," as they call you all. I think the writing was kind of always on the wall with Sasha and Ann running away someday… man, are they disappointed in Talea. I feel awful about that too. They think you're—we're?—headed to al-Svara, though. Also, nobody can read Papa's handwriting well enough to understand his portion of the plans. So that's bought us some time.
But… for the first time in my life, I don't think Mama and Papa are going to be proud of me any more. I know we're doing the right thing by leaving to fight, we didn't have any other choice, we certainly need all the help we can get—but I just keep seeing their faces in my mind when I tell them I ran away from school and went off with you. Unless we can come back heroes—and even that might not matter—it'll break their hearts.
I'm not ready to do that yet.

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Told by Zoë Fiensbane to Blanche de la Force, Loge Haderaa, Nekrotzar , and Tchelio on the voyage of the Messy Bench between Isle Machmorraig and Cape Hildegard, mid-November Y1110.