Sylvester and Tesla were like two peas in a pod. Although they looked nothing alike, dressed completely different from one another, and talked as if they just met each other. There was something about the way they interacted with Mooks and I that prevented me from seeing any differences between them.

Tesla began packing a few bags in the back room, keeping his ominous presence away from any forms of light, while Sylvester led us to the back of the bar to introduce us to Bonny and Klyde. From the names and the conundrum of events that have been happening lately, I guessed they were two others that planned to go to Nirvana with us, maybe names he placed upon objects, or perhaps something else entirely.

Bonny and Klyde, interestingly enough, were two of the most beautiful stallions I’ve ever laid eyes on. They were like sunshine and moonlight; Darkness and Light; Gold and Silver. It’s safe to say that Mooks’s mouth dropped lower than the trenches of the sea when he gazed upon them.

Klyde was layered with a soft matte black from hooves to ears, his darkness reflecting promise and honesty back at me. His eyes sparkled a dazzling chestnut brown under the sunlight, tail wagging and legs ready to ride for days to come.

Bonny on the other hand, had hairs that were possibly more snowy than Mooks’. Her long silver hair running down the back of her neck were like stairs placed as stepping stones to the clouds themselves. Bonny was a warrior, I could feel it with a single glance into her deep blue eyes. She stepped towards me, backed up, then approached again. I gently stretched my hand out, letting her sniff it and get accustomed to my scent. She backed up at first, but after a few careful observations and blinks, her tongue brisked through my fingers. Mooks got slightly jealous, I could see it in the pout he threw towards my direction.

Sylvester began to attach the saddles, followed by the bags of supplies he refused to tell me about. “Beautiful, aren’t they?”

“The best I’ve ever seen…” I whispered, still taken back by their sight.

“There’s four of us, so two will ride on each,” said Sylvesterd as he finished tying a bowline knot around one of the bags.

“EHEM!” Mooks barked at him, growling and displeased.

“Pardon my manners,” Sylvester chuckled innocently. “Five.”

Mooks kept the last of his growles to himself, silently accepting the apology.

I made my way to Klyde now. I wasn’t sure what to expect from a horse this size. Perhaps I should’ve mentioned how much he towered over me, as the top of my head only reached the bottom of his neck. This was one hell of a horse. One I wouldn’t dare to spar with.

Klyde approached me aggressively, but I stayed my ground, not moving a single inch from where I stood. I needed to assert my dominance over him, that was the only way to gain his trust. I could see Sylvester smirking in the corner, while Mooks was practically weeping as if he’d just seen me get killed.

I reached my hand out to him, and he sniffed it carefully, eyes locked onto mine. I was half-expecting for him to do something irrational, or perhaps even gallop into the air like a pegasus. Instead, he bent his strong knees, and lowered himself to me. After turning my head to Sylvester and getting the nod of approval, I climbed atop him, releasing the tension in my lungs.

At first, the sheer height off the ground made me lose my balance, but I caught it just in the nick of time with the saddle heads. I took a few deep breaths, tightened my posture, and let Klyde do the rest. We were a destined match, as if we were meant to be. A man and his horse, and a wolf by the sidelines, jealous and annoyed.

The second I grabbed on, Klyde flew across the ground as if he had no breaks. His legs carried me so freely I truly felt like I was a bird in the sky. The breeze rolling past my hair, the dust sweeping behind us, the power guiding us through any obstacles in our way. With the Rose Blood still in me, I couldn’t feel a single limb in my body. I felt like a feather, and Klyde was the wind that guided me.

After taking me around the block, Sylvester calmed him down and let me off. I could tell Klyde wanted more, but that time would come later, I was sure of it.

Sylvester patted Klyde on the neck and gave him a carrot, “So. What was it like?” he asked me.

He asked me in a tone that made me raise an eyebrow. It was a cheerful, yet dark sort of tone. As much as I wanted to say it was amazing, I noticed a curl in his lip I shouldn’t question. “You’ve never ridden him, have you?”

Sylvester chuckled, giving Klyde another carrot—as he already ate the first—and a soft stroke across his black hair. “Not once in my life...” His voice was sad, strong, and hopeful. “Tesla has, but even then, Klyde shoves him off after a few minutes or so. The only reason I keep him is due to the hardships he would endure if a man with the wrong sort of hands got a hold of him… A horse like this should be against the law, yet here he is, hidden behind an old bar on the edge of town. We’re lucky we have the trees on our backside. Easy escape routes are always needed.”

Sylvester walked over to Bonny and gave her a well-deserved carrot as well. She needed the extra fuel for the march anyway. “Now that Klyde has a man in charge,” said Sylvester, “This’ll be a fun trip indeed.”

…

Over the course of the next hour or so, we spent that time getting ready for our journey to Nirvana. According to sources, a normal ride from Torchmire to Nirvana was roughly eighty miles or so, give or take any abnormalities in the road. On a normal horse, this would equate to a solid day’s worth of riding. Less if guided by a leader who knows a thing or two about rest times and when to increase speed.

Sylvester assured me that Leonidas and Kalvin are most likely forty miles ahead of us. However, with Bonny and Klyde, we might get there sooner.

Tesla led us through a secret passage behind the woods to make sure the horses weren’t spotted on the regular town streetside. One wrong look and we would get stopped without a second’s notice. The passage took some time to clear, but we finally arrived on an open road with only farm fields and trees on the horizon. No towns. No people. No obstacles.

Bonny made room to pack a handful of bags, Sylvester and Tesla on her back. Me and Rina occupied the tremendous amount of space on Klyde, with Mooks barely hanging onto Rina’s shoulder behind her. It wasn’t necessarily the best course of action, as Rina was still slightly dazed and needed every bit of strength she had to grip onto me. Luckily for her, Mooks was soft and fluffy, so his presence was similar to a soft blanket.

Before we could accelerate and cover the distance between Leonidus and where we were, Bonny and Klyde needed to loosen up for the trip, so we started with a walk, which accelerated to a peaceful hustle rather quickly.

“By the way,” Sylvester called out to me, “Those wine bottles back in the bar. Are you not curious what they were?”

I gave him a boring look, “I’ve seen stranger things on my trips. A little healing liquid isn’t enough to raise many questions.”

Sylvester chuckled, Tesla sleeping on his shoulder. “I just thought You’d be curious, that’s all. When you met with Alastor at the ridge, there were a few items he told you to keep track of, were there not?”

I kept my gaze on the road ahead of me, I didn’t want him to dive inside my head again. I knew there were four items, ones I’ll need to look out for in the Vault of Glass. It was a Dragon’s Heart… The Whistleblower’s Tongue… The Key of Hysteria… and the Twin Tails of Lust. At least, I thought those were the four. I had a pretty good memory, it was a shame Alastor never told me what any of those items looked like.

“Those wine bottles,” Sylvester called out, loudly, “They’re the Twin Tails of Lust.”

Of course they were… I sighed, “Let me guess, you stole them?”

“Well… found them would be a better term.” He cackled, slightly waking up Tesla from the confinement of his shoulder. “Any liquid you pour into them gets stored inside. Anytime you ever want something—if it’s been previously poured inside in the past—The bottles will pour it out.”

That didn’t make any sense. How can something like that even exist? I thought to myself. I quickly realized he was looking into my eyes again, so I darted them elsewhere. “Then why are there two of them? Why not just have one? And how does such an item get made?”

“Ever heard of—”

“Wait.” I cut him off, “I changed my mind. Just tell me how you found them and I’ll be satisfied. I’d rather keep myself away from dark arts and items I shouldn’t hold.”

Sylvester drew a smile on his weathered face, his mustache curling with the edges of his lips. “When the king held possession of the bottles, he arranged many feasts in his royal hall. He would make extraordinary claims about his array of fabulous drinks from all around the lands, gathering wealthy individuals to come and pay for their delicious flavor.” Sylvester paused for a moment, gathered a deep breath of air, then continued. “Those wealthy men would pay him loads of money for drinks that hit every part of their taste buds, and he’d spoil them, gathering their riches for his own. Hence why they're called the Twin Tails of Lust. They’ll corrupt a man like no other, urging anyone for more and more, never satisfied.”

“And how exactly did you find them?” I asked.

“Well, I used to be a kitchen staff at his palace back in the day, way before the explosions.”

Explosions? I felt my stomach sink on Klyde’s back. This was possibly the most crucial part of the war. It was the only way I was able to escape, and the only thing I didn’t know. This was the real answer I lodged for.

I turned back around, seeing him staring at me like a painting. His eyes squinted—I was sure he dove inside my head again. I jerked my head back, almost waking Rina in the process. “Tell me,” I ordered.

“There isn’t much to tell really,” said Sylvester, frowning. “The war ended, and innocent children were captured. Tesla and I were the last survivors of the Black Legion, but there was nothing we could really do… Only five years later did we meet our only hope to initiate an escape for those still stuck inside. We heard there was a prison break awhile back, but many from the ground floor weren’t able to break through.”

I sighed, “That prison break… Was it the one that resulted from a pulled lever from one of the kids inside.”

“Precisely,” He answered thoughtfully, already knowing it was me who pulled the lever. “You were young, brave, open-hearted…”

“Save the cries for someone else,” I mumbled, my eyes on the dusty road ahead. “Just tell me how the explosions happened. I deserve to know how my life managed to crawl out of that place.”

“Can’t argue with that…” He huffed, “Unfortunately, I’m afraid I’m not the one who knows much about what happened inside. There was a woman I met—she was a Gifted—who told us she would help any survivors escape. How she said she’d do it? I didn’t know. But I knew I could trust her…” He paused again, possibly recollecting his memories, or letting the breeze pick his silver hair off his forehead. “Next thing I knew, the castle was falling apart left and right, and I never saw her again. As you can possibly guess, she didn’t succeed.”

“I escaped. What success was she looking for?” The second I asked that question I realized how foolish it sounded. With the tone of my voice being as hard as a rock, and the blankness on my face being as plain as a sheet of paper. I sighed again, then turned around.

Sylvester’s expression matched mine. “You survived, yes. But the other 128 people down there didn’t… The king was left with his arms chopped off, so he ordered for a mass slaughter of any survivors inside the Gulag. The castle was rebuilt, and I never heard from Moxy again.”

“Moxy?” I asked.

“That was the name of the woman who infiltrated the castle. Moxy Mora, hair as golden as sunlight, and a temper as short as a one word poem.”

My throat fell into a deep silence. I didn’t know what to think, or say back to him. I always thought those explosions were retaliations against the King, perhaps even another country firing back. But no, it was all done by the hands of one woman. A woman I owed my life to, or whatever remained of it.

“Don’t feel bad,” Sylvester pondered, “I believe you were the only child left. Many of the survivors on the bottom floor were either adults or those who were fairly close to dying.”

“I don’t feel bad… I just wanted to know what happened…”

Sylvester gave Bonny a light tap, letting her catch up to Klyde with a few long strides. The road was quite narrow, so I steered Klyde to the side and let Bonny through. Seeing these two side by side was like watching a king and queen walking across the red carpet. Well, a king that wasn’t a cold-hearted mischievous tyrant who wanted nothing but to gain and destroy.

I could see Klyde urging to let loose across the dirt-road ahead of us. His hooves stomped against the ground like a bull waiting to be released from its cage.

“You ready?” Sylvester asked me, noticing Klyde’s eagerness to rush forward. “We have a lot of ground to cover in a brief time frame.”

I nodded. “Mooks,” I reached for the horse lead and gripped it tight inside my sweaty palm. “Hold on tight. This’ll be a bumpy ride.”