Morning light filtered through the warped glass of the inn's upper room, soft and golden and entirely too cheerful for three people who had just spent the last month crawling through thirty floors of illusions, elementals, undead, and one very angry dungeon guardian.
Vesna sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on her knees, staring at the floorboards like they owed her money. Her long brown hair was still braided with the small gold bands she'd worn since the griffin attack years ago, but a few strands had worked loose during the night. She looked… tired. Not the bone-deep exhaustion of battle, but the quieter kind that came from finally stopping long enough to feel everything she'd been running from.
Zzyzx was sprawled across the single chair like she owned the place, pink-azure tendrils lazily curling around the armrests. She had discovered "breakfast" three days ago and was currently working her way through a third plate of honeyed flatbread with the focused intensity of someone who had spent her entire existence eating goblins and beetles.
Leshwai was curled in Vesna's lap like a possessive mossy loaf, tiny antlers glowing faintly. Every time a serving girl knocked on the door to bring more food, he puffed up, growled, and tried to hide Vesna behind his fluff. The jealousy had softened into something almost sweet — but only almost.
The room smelled like warm bread, woodsmoke, and the faint metallic tang that always clung to Voidbinder now. The sword leaned against the wall, its hilt catching the light in a way that made the old caravan crest on the pommel gleam strangely.
Zzyzx licked honey off her fingers with a forked tongue and grinned. "They keep calling us heroes downstairs. I like it. It comes with extra butter."
Vesna gave a tired huff that might have been a laugh. "They're calling us heroes because we cleared a dungeon that's eaten entire adventuring parties. Doesn't make it true."
"Speak for yourself," Zzyzx said, stretching luxuriously. One tendril reached out and gently booped Leshwai on the nose. The little gremlin puffed up again, but this time he only grumbled and tucked himself tighter against Vesna's side. "I feel very heroic. Especially when they bring more of these." She waved the flatbread like a trophy.
Vesna's gaze drifted to the window. Outside, Glintspire's sky-bridges glittered in the distance, floating markets drifting lazily between the spires. They had come here for rest and resupply after the dungeon, but the city already felt too loud, too full of eyes. People recognized them now. Whispers followed them in the streets. "The adventurer girl with the living ribbons." "The one who survived the Echoing Depths and her strange pack."
She hated it.
But she also… didn't.
For the first time in years she wasn't sleeping with one eye open, waiting for the next griffin or goblin raid. She had people who watched her back. People who stayed.
Leshwai made a soft chirping sound and nuzzled her hand. She scratched behind his leaf-like ears automatically.
Zzyzx noticed. Her teasing smile softened into something quieter. "You slept deeper last night. I could tell. No nightmares about the caravan. No waking up reaching for a dagger that wasn't there."
Vesna didn't deny it. "Yeah. Guess having two loudmouths snoring on either side of me helps."
"Hey, I don't snore," Zzyzx protested, tendrils waving indignantly. "I hum. Elegantly."
Leshwai gave a tiny, skeptical "grr."
Vesna's lips twitched. It was the closest thing to a real smile she'd managed in days.
They stayed like that for a while — no urgent quest, no monsters trying to kill them, just the three of them existing in the same room without the world trying to tear them apart. It felt… nice. Dangerous, in its own way. Nice things had a habit of disappearing on Vesna.
A knock at the door finally broke the quiet. Before Vesna could even answer, Zzyzx's tendrils snapped back like startled snakes. The pink-azure mass dissolved into shimmering mist and flowed smoothly under Vesna's shirt, settling against her skin in a familiar, protective coil. Only a faint shimmer remained visible along her collarbone.
The innkeeper's daughter poked her head in, eyes wide with that mix of awe and nervousness that had become annoyingly common.
"Guild runner just dropped this off for you," she said, holding out a sealed parchment. "Said it was urgent. Something about the Glassroot Labyrinth reopening."
Vesna's stomach tightened before she even took the paper. She broke the seal, scanned the lines, and froze.
There, stamped at the bottom in faded ink, was an old merchant crest.
Her family's crest.
The same one that had been on every wagon, every ledger, every memory she still carried of her father's voice calling out route numbers at dawn.
The job was simple on paper: investigate the reopened subterranean trade route known as the Glassroot Labyrinth. Several scavengers had gone missing. The guild wanted survivors, records, and a safe route map if possible.
But Vesna wasn't seeing the words anymore.
She was seeing wheels turning on a dusty road years ago. Hearing her mother's laugh. Smelling campfire smoke and the particular spice her father always added to the stew.
Zzyzx's voice murmured softly inside her head, warm and close. Vesna?
Leshwai sat up, ears twitching, sensing the shift.
Vesna folded the parchment slowly, her voice quieter than she meant it to be.
"I'm taking this one."
She stood up before either of them could answer, already reaching for her cloak and her father's dagger.
Zzyzx and Leshwai exchanged a look — one hidden symbiote and one mossy gremlin who had both just realized the same thing.
Their pack was about to chase something that might break it.
And none of them were going to let her do it alone.