Reluctantly Rogue Pt. 01 Ch. 007

(Note: This is a long, ongoing story. It is a story with sex. It's a sexy story. It is in many ways a story about sex. But, it is not strictly a sex story. Many chapters may even be SFW.)

CHAPTER SEVEN

In Which We Get Nowhere

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The Birdhouse sat at the top of a tall knoll near the edge of Woodstead, surrounded by a few small stands of young-growth birches. From the door, a clear view was afforded of much of the town. The main road was the same that ran East to West through the Brookwood, along which Atyr had traveled. Where it passed through the center of town, over a dozen small shops stood close together, along with a handful of other communal and official buildings. At the eastern end of town lay the small field of the empty market square.

Scattered across several low, gentle hills, the rest of the town was comprised of a few hundred homes, ranging in size from rustic, one-room cabins, to modest timber and plaster houses, and even a score or so of the larger, more refined dwellings of the wealthier inhabitants at the North End. All around, the small town was hemmed in by the trees of the Brookwood, except to the south, where the land flattened and was cleared in small patches of farmland.

To the east, a spire rose, rocky and bare, with a watchtower at its peak, overlooking all the surrounding lands. It crumbled, long in disuse, serving now only as a reminder of a less happy time.

A dusty, foot-beaten track wound in gentle curves from the front doors of the Birdhouse, down the side of the knoll to the main road. As soon as Atyr rounded the first curve, putting a few trees between himself and the building, his tiny, annoying companion plopped down onto his shoulder without warning. Pesky was especially agitated, especially excited, and thus especially annoying.

"I thought you would never leave! How many times did you have to thank that lumpy, grey girl? 'Oh yes, I'll return before I leave to say good bye to you, fair lady,'" She was attempting to imitate Atyr's voice again, with the same bizarre effect. "'Oh no, I couldn't possibly leave without returning to thank you again. And again! And Again!'"

By now they had made it to the main road. A few people were out, heading to or from the small assortment of shops that lined the wide dirt way. Atyr was unsure if any of them were close enough to hear, and whether he would appear to be talking to himself if they did. Could everyone see the little sprite? Either way, he didn't feel like dealing with that attention right now. He ducked off the main road and cut behind the buildings, heading for the tree line at the edge of town.

He hissed through his teeth. "I am entirely certain I said none of that." He looked around, concernedly. "Can people see you?"

The Sprite ignored his question. "'Ah, fair maiden, the touch of thine healing hands hath sprung in me life anew! The softness of thy-- '"

Atyr adopted what seemed to be his best defense against the tiny woman: he walked on silently. She chattered a moment more, but seemed to run out of suitably embarrassing words to put in Atyr's mouth.

"Actually," she said after a moment, "If I'm being honest, I thought you were rudely polite and chaste with the young woman."

He looked sidelong at her. "Rudely polite?"

"Yes. Rudely polite. It would have been much more gentlemanly of you to let slip at least a hint of your burning desire for her. You are such a dummy."

"I'm not sure you understand what "gentlemanly" means to us humans. And I do not feel "burning desire" for her. I am grateful that they saved my life, Kella and Bird." Hissing all this between his teeth was becoming difficult.

"They didn't. I saved your life. You saved your life."

Atyr stopped. "Ok. We need to go talk about that. I have no idea what's going on, what's-- let's go."

"I feel like the old one already explained everything important to you. The rest of it is just having fun!"

Atyr looked at her as best he could, seated just beside his ear, then glanced around him at the nearby houses. No one was in sight, but every window could be hiding curious ears. Hurriedly, he walked on, headed for a place he knew well, a wooded clearing by a stream just outside of town, a place where he could talk to the sprite about fae quests without ending up as the most gossip-worthy event Woodstead had experienced in years.

Pesky stayed blessedly quiet for a short while as he walked, before apparently becoming unable to resist one final comment.

"She was absolutely begging you with her eyes to return before leaving town though, even if you were too much of a dummy to notice."

The trees stood tall, straight, and quiet around them, afternoon sun glowing warmly through the leaves, splattering everything with gentle splotches of amber and shadow. A breeze whispered between the smooth trunks. The stream glittered and babbled over the pebbles of its bed.

The serenity did little to still the agitation in Atyr's mind. He sat for a short time, running his tongue along his lower lip, fingers tracing patterns on his palms, trying to figure out what to say, and how to say it.

Through some miracle of the Fates, Pesky allowed him the quietude, flitting restlessly around between the trees, looking at various, seemingly random objects with a playful interest.

Finally, Atyr spoke. "I just want to explain to you what the past three days, no, I think five days, have been like for me." Pesky drifted back towards him, turning a slow cartwheel in the air, before landing on a branch a stride from him, settling down on her back, as though ready to nap. He paused. "Are you listening?"

"Intently." She yawned lazily, and rolled onto her stomach, dangling her arm idly off the small branch and drawing small circles in the air below.

Atyr frowned, but continued, certain that she was indeed listening, albeit in the most annoying way possible. He breathed in long and slow.

"Ok. So. I'm working away, trying to build a place for myself. A spot of my own. I can live there: fish, hunt, forage, maybe grow things. I can work wood. I carve, you know? I can bring it to town to sell. Tools, toys, trinkets... maybe I meet a woman, maybe we marry, we have kids, we grow old, we die, the kids live on in the cabin." He paused to look at her. Pesky apparently wasn't planning on responding, so he opened his mouth to continue.

She cut him short. "Sounds boring."

He rolled his eyes. "It would, to you, I'm sure. That's what I had planned though. Well, obviously I can't really plan the family and all, but the point is, I was building a place to live. I was building a life. I'm a full score of summers now. A full man." He ignored the derisive snort from the branch.

"Then, one day, I start feeling all weird. Like, something's really hitting me. It hits me so hard I slip and break my hatchet." He glared at the sprite, who was still feigning boredom. "That hatchet is just about the most important thing to me right now. I can't build without it. So breaking it is a fae-cursed bit of luck."

Now Pesky reacted, just slightly; her arm ceased it's lazy swinging. "Fae-cursed" may have been an unusually apt curse.

Atyr continued. "And cutting my leg was no fun either. But here's where the last few days really went into the wilds for me. I go to clean the cut and wash the blood off my pants. Suddenly, I get... I get attacked- or, well-"

"The word is 'seduced', dummy."

His cheeks began to burn. "That woman, Elatla, she came for me, and --"

"You came for her as I remember it."

"Thank you, Pesky. Ok, fine, she tried to suck my dick, and then kill me. She dragged me under. You saved me, I guess? Then I passed out, I think. Then I woke up, and you did your weird voice thing to me, and I think I passed out again. Maybe a couple times. I don't know, it's a blur. Then I woke up, and tried to get dressed, but you made me, made me get-"

"You came in your pants."

"You made me do it! And then, I don't know, maybe I passed out again? The I wake up, and it's night, and I try to stay awake, but then I'm out again, then I wake up naked, out in the open. You seeing how luckless crazy this is already, for me?"

The sprite looked at him. She shrugged, then turned away and began swinging her feet back and forth, like a bored child at lessons.

"Well, it was crazy for me, ok? But then you come back, and you use your voice on me again, and you talk me into the eddy, and then she's there again, and..." Face blazing now, he swallowed, as his body began to respond to the memory. "And- and then she, Elatla I guess, she was back and she came for me again, and, and-"

"Like I said, that time it was definitely you coming for her. Right down her throat, as I reca-"

"Will you just listen?" The sprite giggled. Atyr stumbled on. "And, and then maybe I passed out again? And then I tried to walk to town, and my leg went sour, and the world faded, and all I knew were voices, in and out, and then suddenly, I'm awake, and I'm naked, and those two women, Bird and Kella, they're talking to me, and I'm getting up, and I'm leaving and... and now here we are. For days, I haven't had a moment where I truly understood what was happening to me, and I've just been tossed around, back and forth, with no control, and I almost died, twice, and then I wake up, and suddenly I find out I have to go on some fae quest or something, and that apparently I chose this?" His voice was getting louder than he meant it to now.

"Well I didn't choose it, ok? I just woke up and found out! So, it's time for you to do some explaining, and I mean really do it, explain what is going on. Why are you following me? And what is this?" He yanked up his sleeve, pointing to the symbols Bird had shown him earlier.

Now Pesky dropped down off the branch, fluttering over to land on his arm. "That? It's your Class, dummy."

Atyr bit his lip, trying not to swat the little creature away from him. "I don't. Know what. That is."

"Neither do I, obviously."

His fists clenched, but he kept his voice low. "What do you mean, neither do you?"

"I can't read it. It's just for you."

Atyr stared at her. "But what is-"

"What does it say?" she cut in.

"It says," he closed his eyes. "It says 'Ranger, Level 0."

"Oh booorring, of course it does. I should have guessed. How original. Boy from the woods gets Ranger, and now we get to go look at animal prints and poop and pick dumb plants. So unique, the boy who likes trees gets the boy-who-likes-trees Class. And now I'm stuck with him."

Atyr had no idea what she was talking about, but he was nevertheless annoyed. In fairness, that was to be expected with the frustrating little creature. "Then," he said, "it has 'Rogue (subclass) - Level 0.'"

Pesky turned and looked at him, flying closer. "Oooooh, so you're all fancy, huh? A subclass right away? And a Rogue. Oh, a Rogue! Oh, maybe this will be fun after all..." She flew high up in a spiral. "Oh yes, I knew I was right to pick the sexy tree boy."

Atyr stared up at her, bewildered. "But what does all of that mean?"

Pesky drifted happily through the air, and looked down at him, "I told you, it's your Class. It's who you are. Obviously."

"Do I have to do some sort of Quest now? Bird said your kind send people on Quests?"

Pesky hovered, stopping her looping flight. "Oh, I suppose if you want to. Yes, I could find a Quest for you." She drifted aimlessly in the air. "I really don't have any plans in mind."

Atyr was getting more confused, not less. This was not how he had hoped the conversation would go. "So...so I can just go back to my cabin after I finish what I need to do in town? And, and nothing will stop me? You won't stop me?"

Pesky froze, then drifted back down to his level. "I won't stop you."

"Ok. Ok, that's... honestly, that's very relieving to hear. Ok."

Pesky, fluttering close to him now, beamed innocently.

"Ok, so I'll just... I 'll just get my supplies and head back then?"

She nodded, "You're allowed to do whatever you want."

Atyr paused, and looked down at his fidgeting hands. He looked back up at the tiny woman, glowing with a pale, dusty haze, somehow cold against the warm sunlight. "So... so did you bring me back to life? Back at the Healing House there?"

Pesky drifted closer. "I gave you a choice, Atyr. A choice to be my adventurer, or to remain what you were before."

He stared at her. This close, and for once holding still, he could see her clearly. She was beautiful. Tiny, delicate, intricate, translucent almost as though made of tiny points of soft light. Her features weren't remotely human. The face was long and pointed, the white eyes large and round, wide-set, the nose far smaller than it should have been, and pointed, and the lips larger, wide and full. Truly seeing her, he began to feel that same weird feeling of sensuality, of inexplicable eroticism. He pulled back and looked away, disconcerted, trying to remember what he had just asked.

"I... remember choosing-- I remember choosing to die."

"Do you want to be dead, Atyr?"

"No! Of course not! I just-- when I was sick I--"

"Then you didn't choose it."

"But I did! I remember it. I remember wanting, wanting comfort, the silence..." His voiced faded, afraid of the words he was speaking.

"It doesn't sound like you chose death to me, Atyr."

"But--"

"Choosing something doesn't make it a choice."

"...What?"

"You're alive, dummy, and the only way that's possible, is that you chose it. I could only offer. Agreeing was all you. No matter what you think you chose."

Atyr wasn't sure he followed, but that was the least of his questions. "So, why am I alive then? If everyone knew I would die."

"Oh, that's easy!" Pesky spread her arms and spun in the air. "Fae-touched heal up like that! A full night's sleep, and most any injury will fade away. Especially a tiny cut like that." She grinned at him. "You wouldn't be much fun for us if you had to take a week or two to recover every time you got a few bumps."

"Fun for you? Is that what this is? That is what this is, isn't it? Some kind of faerie game you've dragged me into?"

"Oh. Yes, that's pretty much it."

Atyr stared at her delicate face, disbelief on his features. She grinned back happily.

"A game," he repeated. "Fine. It's all a game to you. Ok. So, but, what does that mean? I'm part of your game now, so I heal up overnight, no matter what?" That was, Atyr reflected, pretty much exactly what had just happened to him, but that didn't make it feel real, like something that could be expected to happen again reliably.

The response was bright and cheerful. "Yup, that's how it works!" She paused. "Well, you won't regrow a leg or anything like that, but otherwise..."

Atyr took a moment to digest that. He had made some sort of agreement with the fae, (he still wasn't clear what) and now any injuries would heal themselves as he slept? Maybe he was still asleep, lost in the fevered nightmares, about to succumb to his soured blood. That certainly seemed more plausible. Not entirely sure this was reality, he plunged on anyway.

"Ok, so, let's say I decide to climb this tree as high as I can, and jump from the top. What happens?"

"That would hurt a lot."

"But tomorrow I'd be fine?"

"Depends."

"Depends?"

"Depends on how tall the tree is."

He slapped the trunk. "This tree. Tomorrow I'd be fine?"

She looked up. "I don't know."

Atyr thought for a minute, trying to plan out a question that might force an actual, useful answer.

"Why don't you know? Do I only heal up overnight sometimes?"

"No, always."

"So, if I jumped from the top of this tree, tomorrow I would be fine."

"Maybe." Pesky was beginning to drift away across the little clearing.

"Oh come one, just give me a real answer."

"I don't want to."

Atyr looked down at the ground, jaw tense. He looked at the sky, then squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. "Ok, can you tell me why you don't want to? You won't give me any answers, or just this answer?"

"This one."

"...Alright. Fair." He stared at her sullenly. Seems like some fairly important information for me to have though."

Pesky was quiet, still turned away.

He tried a different topic. "Ok them, are you going to explain what a Class is?"

"Oh! Oh yes," she said, spinning three times before coming to a stop facing him, cheerful once more.

Atyr breathed deep, and settled himself. "So, what is it?"

Still beaming, she answered. "I already told you dummy, it's what you are."

Atyr tried a while longer, posing questions to the sprite, sometimes getting answers of a sort, sometimes not, but it quickly became clear that whether not she thought she was explaining things, he wasn't really gaining any further understanding of his situation. Finally, he stood up and looked around him at the trees, light coming through the trunks at a low angle now.

"Ok, well, I guess I need to do a couple things before everyone closes up. Drop off my hatchet at the smith's, see if there's still lodging available at Gant's Place. I have a fair bit to do here before I head home and get back to work on the cabin." He looked at Pesky, apprehensive that there might be a protest, a demand that they set out on whatever it was her 'adventure' might entail.

She buzzed distractedly around him, "Ok, sounds good. I probably won't be around much while you're dealing in town."

He glanced over at her as she flitted around, still not ready to believe she was dropping the whole adventure thing. "Any chance you might just not be around much in general?"

Pesky turned a slow, irritating pirouette in midair, and drifted over to one of the birches.

"Alright. Ok then." He looked at her one more time, but she was now apparently fascinated by the process of pealing off small shreds of bark. Shrugging, he set off, weaving around tree trunks to head back to the town proper.

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Thanks so much for reading! Chapter 8 will be out in a few days.