Siiiiigh.

Right, okay. Guess this is his problem now. Another cult. Hooray. He's so excited. Maybe this time they'll all dress in ominous red cloaks instead of in ominous black ones. Well, no use whining about it. Let's go down the standard cult procedure list.

  Does this particular cult have a history in this town?

After some asking around: yes. About nine years ago, a demon attempted to invade Toril. He was foiled by a travelling adventurer, who sealed the portal and prevented a minor demonic invasion cropping up. He's glad to hear it got foiled. Sounds like they want to have another crack at it. Which of course means that they think this time it will actually work, which probably involves the girl they kidnapped. Speaking of:

  Who is the person they kidnapped and why would they want to snatch her?

Soon enough, he learns that she's the orphaned daughter of the adventurer who sealed the portal. Probably her blood will help unseal it in some way, because of course it will, or maybe the cult's just feeling vindictive. Still, they will probably be at the spot they tried this last time, so:

  Where was their portal located last time around?

He gets a cave marked on his map. Damn it. Another cave. Why doesn't anyone set up in a nice little cabin on the lakeside, or something? He'd set his base up in a nice little cabin on the lakeside. Whatever, fine, another cave, yep that's fine.

He wheedles a rough estimation of how powerful these cultists are out of a frightened farmer. After approximately three worried sentences from the frightened farmer, he quietly infers that he is not going to have any trouble with the cult. A dozen half baked wizard wannabes and a mid-tier demon lord? Yeah, okay. Maybe this will spiral out of control like his last two adventures, he'll definitely be careful, but uh. Yeah the cult itself isn't going to be much trouble.

But that's no excuse for sloppy work, so before he goes running off to foil the cult, he politely knocks on a door. Time to ask the kidnapped girl's parents about any special qualities her kidnapping might bestow upon the cult.

The door opens.

A woman with a few too many frown lines and a few too few laugh lines in a Respectable dress and Proper hairstyle opens the door.

"Yes?"

A slightly scruffy looking man in far too much black and far too much jewelry to qualify as either Proper or Respectable smiles politely back at her.

"Hello, ma'am. I'm sorry to bother you, but I heard your daughter was kidnapped? I was hoping I might be able to help."

"Foster-daughter," she corrects. "My cousin's child. And yes. What, ah, what kind of help were you thinking of?"

Something in him twitches a bit at the correction to foster, like that's somehow more important than the word daughter, but he doesn't press the issue. Now is really not the time.

"I have some experience with these kinds of things. Cults and demons and the like. I was hoping I could ask you a few questions so I could better handle the situation, if it's not too much trouble."

He doesn't look particularly imposing. Average height, wiry build, no noteworthy scars to be seen. He has a couple of swords at his hip, and his armor looks like it could maybe stand up to something, but he lacks the imposing aura typically found on someone with a lot of power. Someone inexperienced with adventurers might not notice the way he carries himself, like a man with so much experience that the dangerous tasks before him have become dull.

She looks skeptical. "Young man, are you sure you know what you're getting into?"

Oh, Tymora. This is why he misses Valen. Or Aribeth. They would look properly imposing and prevent this kind of condescension.

"Cave full of wizards attempting to summon a demon of mid-level position and power and open a portal to the Abyss. The sooner it's handled the better, before there's a swarm of demons to deal with," he says, trying to sound professional without talking down to the woman, sounding arrogant, or dismissing her concerns. "But if your daughter has any strange bloodlines or the like, that might complicate the situation. Anything that you know of?"

"Certainly," she sniffs. "Her father, if you can call him that when he never even stuck around long enough to meet her, was half-Celestial."

"Ah," he says. Yep, that definitely explains the kidnapping. He is reminded of a deva kept by a different cult, and how they'd used her blood for creating flesh golems. He rather hopes that this one has treated its victim better than that. "Any idea where he left to, and if they might be interested in using her as bait to try and draw him into a trap?"

It's a long shot, but hey, he's half-Celestial. Maybe being half of a fundamentally good Outsider is enough to nudge him towards parental responsibility in a crisis. Or maybe not. Maybe he's just dead in a dungeon somewhere, the expected end of most adventurers.

"I haven't the faintest idea. My cousin might, if she weren't two years dead."

"All right. Thank you for your time, I'll do my best to see to it that your daughter is safe."

Awfully unconcerned about the girl's welfare, though, isn't she. That 'foster-daughter' correction sure did set the precedent. All spite and condescension and entitlement, no room left for a young girl that lost her mother and probably feels pretty damn alone in the world. Yeah, he knows your type, lady. He'll... figure something out. Some way to make this better. He's not sure what, yet, but he'll figure it out.

"Thank you," she says, politely, but without a lot of conviction that he can actually do anything.

That's fine. He doesn't particularly care what this woman thinks of him.

Off he goes, to save the day.

The cave isn't hard to find, especially when he's got a map to it. He finds the cave. Any defenses on the outside of the cave, traps, guards, the like? He's expecting magical traps over just about anything else, because these are wizards and of course they're going to use magical traps first and foremost.

The magical traps seem to favor quantity over quality. This place is hella trapped.

Of course it is. Well, at least they put in the effort. Unfortunately for them, quantity over quality doesn't really help when you're dealing with someone like him. Quantity over quality means that people that specialize in disarming traps will just eviscerate each and every one of the poor quality traps with ease. Like Veron. Veron is a man of many talents, and one of those talents is 'disarming traps.' Comes from being the type to sneak around ahead of everyone. The traps get disarmed while everything's quiet, so the people in metal armor with large sharps don't have to worry about stepping on them.

What was that about hella trapped? It's not, anymore, now it's just a cave entrance.

Onward!

There are some cultists inside!

Neat. He'll just keep on being an unstoppable (and currently transparent) teleporting master of stealth, then. They can go right on not spotting him.

Where are they keeping their victim/potential hostage? She's his priority.

She is, it transpires, tied to a chair in a worrying style of fancy, involving bones and blood and all kinds of things an eight-year-old probably shouldn't be exposed to let alone tied to.

She is looking down and sitting very quietly and has a lot of bruises.

Veron is a man who knows his bruises. He's had more than enough of his own. Some of those are way too old to be from the cultists. Yep. He's fixing that. Also the part where she's tied to a really gross chair. That's also getting fixed.

Right, okay. Anyone immediately nearby that could potentially hurt her if things get hairy?

There is a guy taking a whetstone to a shitty sword and keeping half an eye on her sitting about a meter away from the gross chair.

Hmmm. Should he try talking to these people, that tie eight-year-olds to chairs and try to summon demons?

... Nah.

Right then. He considers the girl, quietly weighing his options to remove her from the line of fire as quickly as possible. This will probably freak her out a lot, but he does not like where she's situated in this room, and he doesn't think he can properly warn her without potentially losing his element of surprise. She's been through a lot, it would be understandable if she immediately reacted upon learning that someone's come to save her. And from what he can tell, she doesn't look like the type to scream and kick.

He slips behind the man who is sharpening his shitty sword, and tidily whacks him over the head with the pommel of his much nicer sword. Then before the man has the chance to hit the ground in a heap, he hops over to slice through the girl's ropes like his sword hasn't even noticed they're there, and in a smooth motion tosses an orange potion at some of the nearby cultists, scoops the eight year old up into his arms, and pulls her with him into a shadowstep.

The whole world turns grey and freezes. The potion hangs mid-air, the guy is frozen mid-slump. It's like he's stopped time, but of course, that's not actually what's happened. They're just moving and perceiving so quickly that it looks frozen.

"Hi," he says, projecting calm confidence as he carries her to an out of the way corner where she will be out of the line of fire. Doing this kind of thing is tricky, and he definitely can't keep it up forever, but he has long enough for a couple of sentences. "Sorry about the surprise, I'm getting you to a safer spot. Stay very still and quiet, okay?"

"...Okay," she says, a little stunned.

He sets her down in the corner. He smiles warmly at her.

"It'll be okay," he assures, with absolute sincerity.

And then the world regains its color and time starts to move again. All at once, there's a crack of glass breaking followed by a fwoosh of fire, and then he fades to black and disappears. Or, well, shadowsteps away from her.

These cultists are about to have a bad time.

The cultists are having such a bad time. Some of them would like to file complaints to his squishy organmeats with their shitty swords. Others prefer fire, lightning or acid as a method of communication.

He understands their complaints, really, but have they considered that he is a ludicrously experienced teleporting shadow master? Because they really should consider that.

The shitty swords do not get to go to his squishy organmeats, he needs those. He's not going to be anywhere where the swords will meet his squishy organmeats. The fire and acid are easily dodged, the lighting manages to zap him (he's not actually fast enough to dodge lightning) but he has dealt with much worse things. He can grit his teeth and carry on. Wizards get to experience his counterargument: his much less shitty sword, to their squishy organmeats. From behind, because he shadowstepped there.

(He is not using Ex-Enserric with these people; they're obviously terrible, but they're not the 'my soul deserves to be eaten' levels of terrible that call for the soul eating sword. He uses the creatively named frost sword, Frostbite. He is not responsible for the name, he's sorry. Devils have terrible senses of humor.)

The cultists consider complaining about devils' sense of humor but opt to instead die.

Yep. It's a pretty one sided fight. Soon enough all of the cultists are dead or unconscious. He ties up the ones who are unconscious with the efficiency of someone who has done this kind of thing a lot.

Once he's done with that, he returns to the girl, sword returned to its sheath.

"Hey," he says, gently. He motions next to where she's sitting. "May I?"

"...Okay," she says quietly.

He sits down next to her, careful not to crowd her.

"Would you like a healing potion?" he offers.

She gives him a slightly wary look. "Why?"

"I've had my fair share of bruises, and I don't much like them, myself."

She considers, and then nods.

"All right."

An eight-year-old shouldn't drink a full adult sized healing potion, but he has a spare clean vial or two. He can just carefully pour half of one into another vial for later, dilute what's left with water from his canteen so it'll taste a bit less awful, and offer her the concoction.

"It'll taste a bit awful, but it'll work."

She drinks it without complaining about the taste. "Thank you," she says when she's finished.

"You're welcome," he says, with a small smile.

Her bruises feel kind of tingly, but they stop hurting. If she watches, she can see some of the yellow ones fade away entirely. The fresher ones start to fade, too, but they're taking longer at it.

She looks at her arms and sees the reduction in bruise.

"Are you going to take me back?" she asks, quietly, in a tone that would be afraid if it had more hope in it.

"My exact words to your foster-mother," he explains, "were 'I will do my best to see to it that you are safe.' And I think I wouldn't be doing that if I just took you back."

She nods. She looks rather like she wants to cry but doesn't dare.

He produces a handkerchief from his bag of holding and quietly offers it over. Should she turn out to need it. It is soft and silky and a strange shade of purple. He'd offer to hug her, but he thinks that offering right now might make her think that she has to in order to be safe. A handkerchief is much less able to leverage her in some way.

"So if it's all right with you, I'm going to find you some place better to stay. Some place that's, uh. Not there, and not with them."

"...Thank you," she says, and looks at the handkerchief in confusion.

"You're welcome." He notices the look. "Uh - handkerchief. In case of runny noses, bits of dirt or liquids on you that you don't want, that sort of thing. Made to get messy so you're not. You don't have to use it if you'd rather not."

"...I don't have a runny nose," she says, confused.

Shrug.

"They're sneaky things, sometimes. Show up out of nowhere and ambush unsuspecting citizens, and suddenly there's snot everywhere. I like to be prepared. But it's fine, you don't have to keep it if you'd rather not."

He's making such a hash of this. Ilmater, have mercy on him, he doesn't know how to succinctly get across to an eight-year-old that he just wants the best for her and doesn't want to scare her.

"...I don't have pockets."

He'll just. Take back the handkerchief, yep.

"Sorry. Uh. Do you want something to eat? I realize the cultists might not have fed you."

"They did a little. ...But yes."

"Okay," he agrees.

Soup or stew would probably be better for her, or at least better tasting, but they take more time to make than he really has available right now. The foodstuff that doesn't require the time investment is a bit bland, but he was just in town. It isn't stale or unpalatable, or anything. She can have banana bread, dried fruit, a bit of jerky, and water. It is probably much better than whatever the cultists were giving her.

She really likes the banana bread.

Oh good. She can have the rest of it, then.

(He makes a note to introduce her to other foods, later.)

He is going to have to stop her from scarfing it down fast enough to make herself sick.

... Yyyep. Yep, he is.

"Hey," he says, gently. "It's all right. It's not going anywhere, you don't have to rush."

She looks at him suspiciously but slows down a little.

That'll have to be good enough, for now. He bets that she'll slow down once she's assured that he's not going to take her food away, or only give her bread or something. Until then he'll just gently remind her to slow down so she doesn't hurt herself.

She relaxes a little bit when she has finished eating and at no point did he take any food away.

Yep, that's about what he expected. He's totally going to buy this kid some candy when he's in town. It's clearly required.

Unfortunately, he should probably go handle the surviving cultists, and maybe let the townspeople know that the cult problem has been fixed. He does not want to bring Annasarelle to the town, at all. Neither does he want to leave her alone, though. It's times like these that he misses Deekin; Deekin would be great here.

He thoughtfully considers the ground while chewing on this conundrum. Hmm, how to not leave the small child unsupervised without letting her anywhere near the town that mistreated her...

She drinks some more water. That, at least, is not heartbreakingly wondrous to her.

Right, okay. She's old enough for him to just ask her about her opinion, he's being ridiculous.

"Would you rather stay here with a friend of mine and wait until I've handled the this," he waves vaguely in the cultists' direction, "or come back with me to town? Probably while invisible, so you could avoid, uh. People."

"What's your friend like?"

Uh, Ksxksskrth is probably too busy for emergency child watching duties, who would be a good substitute...?

"One moment, let me check which one's free." He smiles at her, then turns and takes a step away so he can quietly mutter to the air in peace. Sssaktsth is the kind of language that's easy to whisper quietly to oneself.

"Hey, Ksxksskrth, is anyone currently free that would be okay with watching a small traumatized child for a little while?" he says

".... Ssaskxssix mentioned wanting to see a material plane some time, and isn't in the middle of her research. And I do not think she would be very frightening."

Oh. Yeah, she'd be good at this. He mutters a thank you, then turns back to Annasarelle.

"Her name's Ssaskxssix," which is a word he shouldn't be able to pronounce but does anyway, "and she's a shadow person. Which means she looks a bit strange and scary and is from a place far away, but she's perfectly nice and won't want to hurt you. She's quiet and sweet - she could probably teach you a cantrip or two, she's studying to become a wizard. But she'll leave you alone if you'd like to be left alone."

"Okay. I want to learn a cantrip."

"All right. I bet she'll be happy to teach you, she likes wizardry. Give me a minute while I bring her here."

He takes a few polite steps away so the summoning itself won't freak the girl out too much. The Plane of Shadow is a plane of connections, of shadows of places that exist in material planes. Compared to most planes, it's good for travel, but aiming can be tricky. At least, without an anchor on the plane one is travelling to. Luckily, Veron knows how to be that anchor. It's difficult, like grabbing hold of something small and slippery in a pool of sticky muck, but he can do it.

Nearby shadows draw together and darken, and a small shadowy shape rises from the floor.

The shadow bows politely to Veron, then steps closer to Annasarelle. It's - thinner than a human. Shorter than most humans, too, with glowing lavender eyes.

"hello," she says, whisper soft. She glances at Veron, then seems to gather her courage from his reassuring smile. She continues on at a slightly louder volume. "i'm Ssaskxssix. but, um, i should probably have a nickname within human vocal range. umm. is Saskia okay?"

"Perfectly pronounceable," he assures her.

"okay. good. um. m'lord mentioned you wanted to learn a cantrip?"

"Yes," she says earnestly, staring at the shadow-woman in fascination.

"i'll be happy to teach you," says Saskia, cheered by the earnest answer. She sits carefully next to Annasarelle. Her dark sheet of ink-black hair moves, slightly, like if she were underwater instead of in air.

"prestidigitation is a good one to start with for practicing with magic for the first time, and it's pretty versatile. it can change things in little ways, like changing a color, or making a small illusion, or a sound. little things. does that sound okay?"

"Yes," she says firmly.

"okay."

Wizardry is a tricky subject; there's a lot of factors to keep in one's thoughts, but Saskia is a patient teacher, and Annasarelle is an attentive student. The lesson goes very well.

Veron, meanwhile, has the fun of dragging cultists back to town. Well, not that there's much actual dragging involved. After making sure that they are very well tied up, gag included, he dumps both of the surviving unconscious cultists into his portable hole, because that is how an adventurer solves a logistics problem. Thank you, magical items. They have enough air in there for the short trip.

He walks back into town as casually the second time as he did the first time. Is there someone important looking he can go dump these cultists off at?

There is a mayor. People will direct him to her if he asks.

Cool. He finds the mayor. Is the mayor currently having any important meetings or anything? This is reasonably time sensitive, but he doesn't want to interrupt.

The mayor is not in any meetings!

Excellent! He still knocks. Manners.

"Hello, sorry to interrupt. I'm Veron Chandler, I uh, I handled your cult problem. There were some survivors, do you have a place to put them for trials and testimonies and such?"

"...We have a jail," the mayor says after a minor stunned pause.

"Oh, excellent. I'll drop them off there, then. I disarmed all of the traps in the cave, but I recommend giving it a day before sending anyone to look at it, I haven't checked it over for lingering magic artifacts and dangerous whatsits. There might still be something risky there. Should be perfectly safe tomorrow, I just wanted to get the cultists squared away before I finished clearing out the place."

"...Alright. Ah, thank you very much."

"You're quite welcome!"

He locates the jail, then has a brief conversation with the jailer. The bewildered jailer watches as Veron unrolls his portable hole and drags out two (still unconscious and very well bound) cultists. After verification that these are indeed known members of the cult, they are summarily tossed into prison.

This job complete, he makes a quick detour to buy important child transportation supplies. A spare set of clothes, a properly sized bedroll, a canteen, her own backpack, enough food for her (candy included) - that sort of thing. He has the money for it.

His shopping done, he gets to the less fun portion of the trip to town. He could just walk away from here without telling her foster parents what happened to her. It'd be easy, even. Nobody would stop him, and nobody would probably even bother coming after him, especially after how he handled the cultists. If this were a few years ago, he probably would have done it. It'd be easier.

Now, though - well. It's not the kind of person he wants to be. So even if this conversation won't be very pleasant, he goes and knocks on a door for the second time today.

The same woman opens the door.

"Yes?" she asks, blinking in surprise.

"Hi again. I solved your cult problem," he announces. Like he's saying that he cleared an annoying stump from a farmer's field.

"I see," she says, not sounding like she believes a word of it.

That's fine. She'll figure it out eventually. "Your daughter having already once been kidnapped for use in an evil ritual, I think it might be best if I made sure she got somewhere where that's unlikely to happen again."

Which is a perfectly reasonable argument as to why he's taking the child away. Not the one he cares about, but not a bad one.

"...Excuse me?"

"Well you see," he says, reasonably, "I said I'd make sure she would be safe."

"If you think you have the right to remove a child from her legal guardians because you said something, I ought to give you an education in the law."

"Ought you," he repeats, pleasantly.

And then all at once the pleasantness drops, and the man that is standing before her is not ordinary at all. The air has gone cold and still, and the shadows around them both darken. His eyes glint a dangerous hint of blue, and there's something unspeakable in them. These eyes have seen Hell, they have stared down a power so great that she can barely comprehend it, and he did not flinch. He did not lose. It is suddenly very clear that this man was not joking about handling the cultists. The cultists were nothing in comparison. This man is not someone to be trifled with. He looks at her, and it's not the gaze of a human staring back at her, it's something else, something more. And he has judged her and found her wanting.

"I saw the bruises. I saw the way she flinched in fear when she asked if I was going to take her home. I don't give a fuck what the law says, you are never touching her again."

The woman squeaks in terror and stumbles backwards, barely catching herself enough to land in a sitting position.

Then the something more is gone, and he's just a man. He smiles at her again.

"Do we understand each other, ma'am?"

"Please get out of my house."

"Certainly. Thank you for your time. Have a pleasant evening."

And then he turns and leaves. He could have pushed further, pressured her to say that she wouldn't ever try to pursue Annasarelle again, but he's pretty sure he doesn't have to. That was enough. She'll swallow the story he gave her and vomit it back out to the community to save her own reputation, like the self obsessed coward that she is. Maybe she'll be brave enough to call him names in the safety of her own home, but that's as far as it'll ever go. He's all right with that.

His business in town concluded, he returns to the cave.

Where Saskia is patiently walking Annasarelle through a second cantrip; Mage Hand, a spell that creates a weak spectral hand that can exert some force upon the world. Together with prestidigitation, they give an aspiring wizard plenty for practicing the finer points of aiming one's will in arcane magic. The theory and memorization can wait; these simple cantrips can help her be sure that whatever later spells she learns will be properly aimed and controlled.

Annasarelle is delighted. There are new things she can do! And nobody can take them!

Aw.

"You're taking to wizardry well," he observes, smiling.

"she's a very good student!"

"Thank you!" Annasarelle says, beaming at Saskia.

"you're welcome."

Veron considers the two of them while fishing out some of the acquired candy from town.

"Would you like to have more wizardry lessons, later? Saskia might not have the time for it, but I could probably find you another teacher if she can't. If you'd like one."

Eight's a bit young for it, but not too young. He sort of wants this child to be assured of her own ability to keep herself safe. Considering.

"Yes, please."

"All right."

Candy has been fished out! Annasarelle may have a caramel thing. Would she like a caramel thing?

Saskia, meanwhile, thoughtfully considers her amount of free time.

She curiously takes the caramel thing. She puts it in her mouth. She makes happy noises.

Aw.

"i think i can. and that i want to. i couldn't every um - day? - there's still a lot of things in the library that i need to look through. but this was nice."

(She looks curiously at the caramel thing.)

"Well, all right."

(Veron distributes a caramel thing to Saskia as well.)

"Thank you," she says, and gets up and walks over to Veron and hugs him.

Oh goodness! He hadn't been planning to pressure her about physical affection, considering, but since she went and initiated it, yes okay hugs! Gentle ones that she could easily escape from.

"You're welcome."

"Thank you too," she says to Saskia, trying to figure out if the shadow-woman is solid enough to hug.

"it's my pleasure," says Saskia, shyly.

She's probably solid enough to hug, she's successfully carrying a solid object; the caramel thing. Something in the construction of the caramel thing's wrapper is apparently confusing though, because rather than trying to figure out how to unwrap it she just turns her hand translucent and insubstantial and reaches through it to grab the candy. For half a second the candy also turns translucent and insubstantial, and then back to normal once it's out of the wrapper.

"... this is delicious," she declares happily, once she finally has extracted it and made it disappear into her face. There is no obvious aperture. Shadow people: weird.

"Can I hug you?" Annasarelle asks finally.

"oh. yes."

She holds out her arms for a hug.

Hug!

She is kind of cold and weirdly squishy, but not actually unpleasant to hug.

It is an interesting texture. Annasarelle hugs her happily.

Eventually she steps away. "Thank you," she says earnestly.

"you're welcome!"

Annasarelle glances back at Veron, seemingly at a loss for what to do next.

"I got you some things," Veron offers, as the something to do next. He offers her the little backpack; he kept it packed light, since she is eight, but it has her water canteen and tidy little wrapped snacks for the road and the spare set of clothes. The bedroll is a bit heavier, so it's in the Bag of Holding, but it's got a nice warm blanket if she'd like it.

"I didn't get anything from your house, I probably should have asked if there was anything you wanted from there. If there's anything irreplaceable back there I can maybe get it, but most things I can just buy for you in the next town we're in?"

She shakes her head. "My foster-mother already got rid of Mama's things."

"Ah," he says. It's kind of amazing, how much measured and calm condemnation he can fit into a single syllable. There's a lot of condemnation, in that syllable.

"... what sorts of things did she have?" ventures Saskia, in the ensuing silence.

"She had a pretty dress," Annasarelle says wistfully, "and three necklaces and a bracelet. One of the necklaces matched the bracelet, she said Papa gave her those. And some books."

Saskia nods, looking thoughtful.

"... the Plane of Shadow has shadows of, um, everything. copies of things. i could maybe help you find one or more of the shadows of them, but i wouldn't know how to find things, uh. here."

"... I could maybe manage it," says Veron, thoughtfully. "Do you know who she sold them to?"

"No."