Chapter One: An Explosive Picnic

If there was one thing about growing up that Rita hated it was the fact that she went from doing monotonous research on random crap in school, to doing monotonous random research for work. Living in Castle Night Thorn might have been a good plus, though she knew she couldn't stay here being Lamont's assistant forever. For now, doing research for him and helping out with his missions gave her a place to live, free food, and money to spend on building whatever crazy invention she wanted.

Rita sat cross-legged on an old wooden chair in the dim light of the tower library. In her hands was an open copy of ‘Dark Myths of Silver Glow’. It was not a particularly well-written book about several myths which could prove useful to her current research. The wall of books surrounding her table all included similar kinds of books on old folklore, reports of strange magic, and dark fairy tales taken straight from the Evergreen and Everfrost themselves.

The shoddy lighting in the aether-powered lamp above her flickered every now and again, and its white light cast the books into strange shadows that seemed less trustworthy now than before she'd begun reading. The creaking of the old wood and the sound of shutters flapping about outside of the windows created the kind of atmosphere which made reading these dark stories just that much more difficult. Rita wouldn’t admit it to anyone else, but she was feeling the teeniest, tiniest bit absolutely terrified of being in here all alone.

Every page she turned only seemed to have darker tales awaiting her. The chaos God Calypso. The dark gifts granted by the Wish Coins. The evil genocides committed by Silver's Ghost legion. Finally, she thought she might have been onto something with the demonic shadows that stole young kobolds in the middle of the night taking them to lands where they could never return.

It wasn't until she chanced upon a passage detailing the Lady of Nightmares that Rita’s heart skipped a beat. She’d been at this search for nearly four hours looking for something along these lines. The image of a shadowy lady with more than perfect curves stood as an artist’s depiction of what this creature could look like.

“The Lady of Nightmares, a creature from our darkest dreams and mistress to the forces of balefire themselves has only left scarce rumors about her. Many people scattered about the kingdom of Silver Glow have mentioned having nightmares of this beautiful creature, be she in human or wolf form, and thinking they were in for a treat following her into the darkness of any forest, cave, or ruin that would appear alongside her. Of course, these dreams all turn to horror as the Lady would reach out and instead of the pleasing touch most expected, they’d feel dreadful chills running down their body, so cold are her fingers that it's like having ice icicles digging through flesh and scraping against bone. All of these dreams end with the dreamer being engulfed by green flames or total darkness. In each case reported thus far, these individuals would awake with a terrible fever and chills still running down their spine. A terrible cold generally follows suit afterward leaving the only conclusion to being that this creature of shadow, the Lady of Nightmares, had caused their illness.”

Out of the corner of Rita’s eye she spotted something move in the shadows. With almost instinctual response she drew her flame-charged revolver and took aim at the shadows. There was a quiet and familiar squeak. Rita growled as she lowered the gun and put it back into the holster at her hip.

Rita went back to her book as she said, “Damn it, Lulu, you know you can’t sneak up on me like that.”

There was silence for a moment before a young woman, standing at only four foot ten inches tall, about the same miserable height that Rita founder herself at, came out of the shadows. This was Lucille Wonder Cross, one of Rita’s closest friends and a proud member of the starling race of humans, indicated by the lavender-colored mark on Wonder’s forehead. Wonder had a fairly unique brand of starling hair comprised of not one of the usual prismatic colors but two colors, sky-blue and silver stripes lined her wavey hair.

At one point Rita had actually been jealous as she herself, as she’d been born a terran, no visible magic to speak of, no magical mark, and only mundane terran brown hair from her father, and her father wasn't even a terran. She wasn’t even lucky enough to get animal features that a lot of terrans sprouted.

Wonder walked up to the table, her eyes narrowed onto the stack of books. “It’s not my fault that you stuck yourself in Lamont's library doing research again.”

Rita rolled her eyes. “And what would you rather be doing?”

Wonder laughed. “Anything more appropriate of a young lady. Trying on cute outfits, playing music and singing, or painting to name a few. Not boring research. I did not graduate Kilik's School for Gifted Individuals to continue wasting my time with such things.”

“Yeah... I'm going to have to pass on all of that. Look if you're going to help me do research on the shadowy monsters, fine, but if you're just going to distract me then leave.”

Wonder folded her arms over her chest and stuck her nose up into the air. “Oh? Is that how it is? I come here to check up on you and you do nothing but scold me?”

Rita lowered her head into the book. “No, that’s not what I meant.”

“Then I guess my delightfully petite figure will just have to be ruined as I'll have to eat all these sandwiches by myself.”

Rita finally took a good look at Wonder and noticed the picnic basket that was under her arms. A sly grin spread over Rita's face. “You're not supposed to bring food in here, buuuut if you give me some of them I won’t tell anyone.”

A matching grin spread across Wonder’s face. “Blackmailing me now are you? Whatever am I to do? I guess I’ll have to share this food which was prepared with plenty of love and care with a demon such as yourself.”

Rita set her book down and threw her arms up. “Fear the mighty demon Rita, for she hungers!”

Wonder pulled out one of the sandwiches, it was a delightful owlraptor and cheese sandwich with mayo. One of Rita’s personal favorites. The two of them took a seat on the cold stone floor as the table was too cluttered to enjoy a meal there. Wonder pulled out her wand and waved it about. The stone floor began to change into bright green grass and a red and white checkered picnic blanket formed beneath them.

“Nice,” Rita said touching the newly formed grass, but as an illusion, she only felt the stone beneath her. “Your illusions are getting really good.”

“Really good? Getting? Surely you jest, I, The Impossible Wonder, am clearly the best illusionist there ever was and have been that way since I was born.” Despite her words, Wonder was still beaming at the compliment.

Rita took a bite of food and said around a mouth full of sandwich, “So what brings you here?”

Wonder glared at her for a moment. “Please don’t talk with your mouth full.”

Rita swallowed and grinned. “Oh come on, don’t be such a girly girl.”

“I will be whatever I want. But if you must know, I came here because Lapis told me you’d been doing research for six hours straight and that she was forbidden from contacting you.”

Rita blinked. “Oh… yeah.”

“What happened this time?” Wonder asked.

Rita grumbled at the thought of how annoyed she still was over this morning’s incident. “Lapis found her way to my panty drawer… again.”

Wonder shook her head but a sad smile formed over her lips. “She has trouble... tempering her interests in you.”

Rita folded her arms over her chest. “That's true, but she’s still our friend so I'm choosing to forgive her.”

“You're not even disturbed at this point are you?”

“Not really. Just annoyed.”

Wonder giggled. “You should steal her panties in revenge.”

“Are you kidding me? I don’t want this to escalate any more than it already has.”

Something slimy and wet rubbed against the side of Rita’s face. Instinct kicked in and she rolled over grabbed for her gun at the same time. Next to where she had just vacated was a single tentacle sticking out of the ground. “Damn it, Wonder!”

Wonder stared at the tentacle with wide eyes. “It wasn’t me.”

A high-pitched voice shrilled with laughter from up above them. Rita looked up to see another young woman with blue and teal colored hair swaying as she hung upside down from the rafters. She wore a set of teal-colored robes with green and blue trim lining them.

Rita growled, thought about pulling the trigger anyway, but forced herself to holster the gun once more. The books were too valuable to risk here. “Lapis!”

Lapis smiled innocently. “What? Don’t you like my tentacle? It can do all… sorts of things.”

Rita was already well aware of what kind of ‘things’ the tentacle could do. Some fun, but potentially regretful memories flashed in her mind. She pushed them aside.

Rita stood up. “Gish damn it. I just wanted to do some research.”

Lapis lowered herself to the ground with a tentacle arm. Once she touched the cold stone her arm changed back into a normal human’s arm. “Actually I came because I wanted to apologize.”

Rita gave her a level look. “Really?”

“Yes.”

Rita shook her head. “Okay, I forgive you.”

“Great!” Lapis beamed. “Now I’m allowed to sneak into your room again!”

“No!” Rita snapped, she saw the contemplative look in Lapis’s eyes and merely shrugged. “Fine, just don’t steal anything, or watch me shower, or watch me sleep, or touch me.”

“But what if I need a hug?” Lapis pouted.

Rita softened her voice. “If you really need a hug, and it’s for good reasons then… ugh I’ll find someone else to hug you.”

Lapis squeed. “YES! Hugs from the sexy, succulent, and sensual Rita!”

A facepalm wasn’t nearly enough of a physical response to Lapis’s typical answer, but it was all Rita really had at the moment. “Fine, whatever, I don’t care. I love you both, but right now I am trying to do research.”

Wonder butted in, she seemed to have finished her sandwich while Rita dealt with the intruder. “Why exactly are you doing research into shadow creatures anyway?”

“That’s,” Rita began before deflating a little, “A really good question.”

Wonder raised an eyebrow. “Wait, you don’t know?”

Rita scratched at the back of her head. “Hehe, uh… well I was asked to do so from Lamont, but he didn’t exactly tell me why.”

Wonder began wiping her fingers clean on a napkin. “You are more than just his dog, you should be allowed to know more about the work you do for him.”

A pang of anger flared through Rita’s heart, but she kept it contained. “I am not his dog, I actually didn’t ask why I was researching it because I forgot too.”

The large wooden double doors swung open and slammed against the wall. This time Rita didn't bother to point a gun at the intrusion, clearly it was just another night of being bothered by everyone in this castle. A man in his mid to late twenties burst through wearing robes of blue and black. Around his neck was a red fox pelt much like one would wear a scarf. He ran up to the trio and stopped just short of colliding into Rita, he was clearly out of breath. “I,” he gasped and wheezed through his sentence, “forgot, to tell, you, something.”

Rita shook her head slowly. “And see that, it was actually his fault not mine.”

Lamont had his hands on his knees and looked about to keel over. “There’s a reason, I’m doing the research.”

Rita continued shaking her head. “And why is that?”

From the doorway, a bulgy humanoid shadow appeared. Lamont looked back at it and said, “That’s why.”

Rita was quick on the draw and Rita had her revolver out before anyone could do or say much of anything. The fire charge roared to life as she pulled the trigger and a bolt of flame spat out of the gun speeding toward the shadowy creature. The flame hit the creature, blasting a fist sized hole through it and then splashed against the stone wall behind it.

Lamont reached out and pushed the gun toward the stone floor. “What are you doing?”

“Killing it!” Rita complained.

“With fire! Inside the library!”

Rita felt suddenly very stupid and very lucky that most of the tower was indeed constructed from stone. The shadowy creature on the other hand regenerated the shadows where there had been a hole in its chest. The thing started a limping charge toward them.

Lamont looked back at the thing. “Also, it takes more than one shot to kill them. What did you learn so far?”

Rita swallowed. “Nothing useful.”

Lapis jumped in front of them, her arms transforming into tentacles before their very eyes. Lapis swung her octopod arms at the creature, slashing through the shadows but only managing to make the thing slow down as it again regenerated from the blows. Rita’s mind galloped and raced for any idea on how to defeat a creature of pure shadow. It was a creature of darkness existing in the light. How could they stop it?

Lamont added, “Huh… usually that has worked, this one’s relatively tough.”

Rita looked back toward the little picnic area. It was as if a light bulb turned on in her mind and she quickly met Wonder’s wide eyes. “Lulu, shoot light at the thing!”

Wonder raised her wand with a shaky hand. A ball of light formed at the tip of her wand and then shot out toward the beast. It hit the beast in the chest, and as soon as it made contact the ball of light exploded into a bright flash, bright enough to force Rita to close her eyes and look away.

For a moment all Rita could see was white, but slowly Rita’s vision came back. The creature had completely vanished leaving no trace behind. Rita looked back to Wonder and saw her sitting on the cold stone floor, the picnic area was completely gone but she was there, safe and sound. Everyone else looked to be okay as well.

With the shadow gone Rita helped drag Lamont over to the chair she had been sitting in and sat him down. She looked at the others and then back to him. With her hands on her hips Rita was about to ask some serious questions, the most important of which of course was, “What's going on?”