(3rd Person POV)
"Watching Sir Lykan and the others react like that..." Apollonia said to Firfel, barely containing her delight. "I cannot wait for the rest of this city to see it."
Firfel nodded. "It is only a matter of time before Arthur restores this theatre to what it once was."
"More than restores it," Sylwen added. "Arthur could change what entertainment means in this world entirely."
They had every confidence in that. This was a world generations behind in its technology — to experience a film for the first time, with no frame of reference for what it would feel like, would be something those people never forgot.
Arthur finished his conversation with Lykan, left a few matters with Leonard, then rejoined the group. Keanu and Kaiser chose to stay behind at the theatre. The rest of them headed toward the inn.
Along the way, they could already hear people talking about the Wizard of Oz flyer. The doubts were plain.
"He-he, this is nothing but a desperate tactic to shift tickets. Mark my words, you walk in there and it's the same tired play they've been putting on since our grandfathers were young."
"Nobody prints claims like that on a flyer unless they've got nothing real to back it up."
"Let's go and find out. If it's the rubbish I think it is, we make enough noise that they're handing out refunds before the night is over."
"I like that plan very much."
Arthur and the others paid them no mind. Apollonia, however, was fuming. The doubts were aimed at Lykan — people still had no idea the theatre had changed hands — but that made it no easier to hear.
'Just you wait,' she thought, jaw tight. 'Every single one of you is going to feel very stupid about this conversation.'
"Let it go, Apollonia," Sylwen said helplessly.
Firfel kept her composure, though the look in her eyes said she wasn't enjoying it either.
Arthur just smiled in quiet amusement.
They reached the inn and settled into the dining room, ready for a meal.
At a nearby table sat the party known as the Six of Diamonds. The whispers spread the moment people noticed them — pointing, murmuring, the particular stir that followed an S-Rank party wherever they went.
Their leader, Aldric, blond and broad-shouldered, glanced over as Arthur's group entered. His eyes moved past Arthur without interest and landed on Firfel. They stayed there.
He stood up and crossed the room with the unhurried ease of a man who expected this to go well. "My, my. I've been in this city long enough to think I'd seen every beautiful woman it had to offer." He smiled at Firfel, chin slightly raised. "Clearly I was wrong. Might I have the honour of knowing your name?"
Arthur turned and looked at him. Said nothing. The absence of any reaction on his face was the kind of stillness that Sylwen, standing just behind him, had learned to find deeply uncomfortable.
Firfel regarded Aldric the way one might regard an insect that had landed on the table. She said nothing.
Apollonia had no such restraint. "Excuse me — do you make a habit of walking up to women without so much as acknowledging the people beside them? This is my sister-in-law. My brother's wife. Perhaps conduct yourself accordingly."
Aldric blinked, genuinely caught off guard. A married elf was not something one came across every day. "Married?" He looked around with mild curiosity, as though searching for someone worth the description. "To whom, exactly?"
"To me," Arthur said.
Aldric looked at him. Took him in slowly, top to bottom, the way a man appraises something he's considering and deciding isn't worth the price. Then he laughed — short, easy, not unkind in the way that made it worse. "You?" He shook his head with a grin. "No offence, friend, but I genuinely cannot picture it. An elf of her calibre, and she chose..." He gestured vaguely at Arthur. "Well. You."
He turned back to Firfel as though Arthur had already left the conversation. "My lady, I'll be straightforward with you — whatever arrangement you've found yourself in, you deserve considerably better. Leave this behind and join our party. You'd want for nothing, I promise you that."
"Your party?" Firfel said, her voice carrying the precise warmth of a closed door.
"The Six of Diamonds." Aldric spread his hands, letting the name do the work. "S-Rank. Best party in this city, finest in the region by most accounts. I think you've heard of us."
At their table, his party watched. Charlotte had stopped pretending to eat, her eyes fixed on Firfel with an expression that could have stripped paint. Brom leaned back in his chair with his arms folded, looking entertained. Cael watched quietly over the rim of his cup, expression unreadable.
"S-Rank party, huh." Firfel said, letting the words sit in the air for a moment. She looked at Aldric the way one looks at something mildly interesting on the bottom of a shoe. "Not bad. Unfortunately, men at your level wouldn't even qualify to be my servant."
The smile on Aldric's face didn't vanish immediately. It curdled slowly, like something left out too long. His eyes narrowed. "Huh." He tilted his head, the pleasantness draining out of his expression entirely. "You've got a mouth on you for an elf. I don't care how pretty you are — you don't get to talk to me like—"
He didn't finish.
His body left the ground and hit the far wall hard enough to crack the plaster, sliding down it in a heap.
"Aldric!" The Six of Diamonds were on their feet in an instant, chairs scraping back, hands going to weapons.
They turned.
Firfel stood exactly where she had been standing, a wand levelled in her grip, its tip still aimed at Aldric where he slumped against the wall. She had not appeared to move at all.
"You talk too much," she said simply.
The dining room had gone absolutely silent. Guests had pressed themselves back from their tables, some half-risen from their seats, nobody sure whether to run or stay still.
Apollonia looked delighted. "I didn't even see you move, sister! What was that?"
Sylwen said nothing. She was watching Firfel with a quiet, measuring expression — the look of someone privately recalibrating something.
Arthur was smiling faintly at his menu.
'These fools,' he thought. 'They walked up and started prodding a goddess.'
"You—" Charlotte's voice came out high and trembling with fury, her knuckles white around the back of her chair. "Do you have any idea who we are?! You can't just—"
"Who cares," Firfel said, not looking at her.
She was still watching Aldric.
Which was why she had already clocked him the moment he peeled himself off the wall — faster than he had any right to be, closing the distance in silence, arm drawn back.
She didn't move. She knew it wouldn't touch her.
Arthur's foot connected with Aldric's face before it did.
The crack of it was sharp and clean. Aldric went sideways and hit the floor, rolling once before stopping, one hand pressed to his jaw with a groan. "...Fast," he managed, through what sounded like considerable pain.
Arthur straightened up, unhurried, and looked across at the party. "I'd suggest we call it there," he said pleasantly. "Before someone gets actually hurt."
Brom had gone a deep, mottled red. "You absolute—"
"Brom." Aldric's voice was flat.
Brom stopped.
The party looked at their leader. Aldric was getting to his feet slowly, one hand still at his jaw, his eyes on Arthur with an expression that had moved past anger into something quieter and considerably more deliberate. He held it for a moment. Then he turned away.
"We're leaving," he said.
"But—" Brom started.
"We're leaving."
Nobody argued further. The Six of Diamonds filed out, chairs still pushed back from their abandoned table, food half-eaten. Aldric was last through the door. He glanced back once — not at Firfel this time, but at Arthur — before he was gone.
The room let out a collective breath.
"That was fast," Apollonia said brightly. "Scared them off just like that."
Sylwen shook her head slightly. "I wouldn't say scared." She kept her eyes on the door. "Did you see his face when he left? That man isn't finished. He's just deciding when."
Apollonia's expression fell. "That's... not reassuring."
"Don't worry." Arthur reached over and ruffled her hair. "Nothing is going to happen to you."
Apollonia straightened up and batted his hand away, but nodded firmly. "Mm!"
They sat back down and waited for their meal.