Aurelia opens her eyes, which is quite baffling to her own self, and finds herself resting on a cloud— or something of equal comfort.
Did the Hoarder save her life... because she wasn't dispensable to him...?
Her heart tugs a little and she jolts up with a smile on her face, but the jolt is quick to turn into an ache as she spots a scowling Lili sitting on a chair right in front of her. One of her hands is wrapped around a leg, tugged close to her chest, and her other leg hangs off the chair. Her ivy eyes are narrowed at Aurelia with fury and the latter decides to fall back into the clouds — which she now realises is a bed — and wish death upon herself.
"Sit back up."
Her voice is cold and commanding. Aurelia obliges in a split second, sitting up straight as her hands feel her neck and wrists for stitches or marks of some sort. There aren't any, to her surprise, they look as plain as they had all her life. Even her neck doesn't ache at all.
What happened?
"You wouldn't die."
"Oh?"
Aurelia gasps, just as surprised as Lili is abhorred. The castle spirit stands up and floats through the bed, closing the distance between them. Aurelia is quick to curl up to the headrest of the bed, trying to keep the distance between them.
"Oh-?! OH-!! IS THAT ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY?! AFTER I RISKED MY EVERYTHING TRYING TO SET YOU UP WITH THE HOARDER?!"
"Oh?! You did?" Aurelia raises her brows, quite fascinated by the situation she is in.
"SHU— SHKUHD, SHUT UP! I HATE THE SOUND OF YOUR VOICE!" Lili seethes. Aurelia is quick to purse her lips and hug her knees to her chest, eyes wandering away to everywhere but Lili.
She realises that she is resting in a room. A room bathed in soft, golden light filtering through stained glass windows. The walls are adorned with intricate tapestries of Merfolks, their vibrant colors contrasting with the muted tones of the stone.
"I TRIED CHOKING, RELEASING POISON IN THE AIR— ALMOST ALERTING THAT DAMNED DRAGON, AND EVEN GETTING THAT DAGGER THROUGH YOU! BUT YOUR STUBBORN LITTLE SPIRIT WOULDN'T BUDGE!"
In the center of the room stood a grand, wooden four-poster bed with richly fragrant flowers for curtains. They make Aurelia scrunch her nose in repulsion.
"STOP MAKING FACES! WHY WOULDN'T YOU DIE?!"
The bed is adorned with plush cushions and a delicately woven quilt, inviting Aurelia to rest and escape this wailing spirit.
"My Queen sacrificed her last bouts of magic just so I could leave the castle and convince that useless Emperor to get the Hoarder in a bond. BUT NO! IT ALL BACKFIRES!"
Nearby, a small wooden nightstand held a flickering candle, casting a small dancing shadow on the wall behind it. Against one wall, a large, ornate wardrobe stands tall, its doors engraved with intricate patterns.
"ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME?!"
Aurelia flinches due to the intensity of Lili's tone. "Y-yes, I am," she breaths out, feeling her arms over her body to realise that her dagger was gone.
"WHY WOULDN'T YOU DIE?!"
"I don't know?!" Aurelia cried out, "Trust me, right now, I'd much prefer to be dead than hear you screech your evil schemes in my ears, okay?!"
Lili's delicate hand goes for Aurelia's neck and presses it against the headboard. Aurelia feels the glaring absence of her cap as her hair and gills hit against the dead wood. "You cannot die from my hands but that doesn't mean I cannot inflict pain on you. Do you understand?!" Lili seethes in her ear, eyes holding a menacing contact.
Aurelia deflects her gaze and it falls on a cozy reading nook beckoned from a corner of the room. A plush armchair with a worn but comfortable cushion nestled next to a towering bookshelf.
"I u-understand, leave me, please? I'll help you. I'll help you. You need to get your Queen back, right? Maybe I can help you with that!" She begs as Lili squishes her cheeks between her thumb and forefinger.
"Look me in the eye and tell me how your pesky little lowlife self with be able to help me?" She jerks Aurelia's head to face herself.
"I-uh," Aurelia's eyes wander again, "I can get close to the Hoarder and get the orbs with the Queen's family in them?" She suggests in a moment of haste.
Lili rolls her eyes with a sigh. Her finger let go of Aurelia and she floats away from the bed to a beautifully carved vanity with a large, ornate mirror stood adorned with dried flowers. "Pathetic," Lili whispers, waving a hand to let the flowers bloom again, "You're so exasperating and pathetic, it pains me."
Her voice breaks and Aurelia is horrified to find literal tears in Lili's eyes. "Excuse me?! Are you crying?!" She gasps, jumping off the bed and running up to the spirit. Though, her steps are a bit disoriented and her balance a little shaky without her cap.
"When folks die or cease, their soul essence can be saved into orbs. They're all dead. What can you help with?!" Lili cries dramatically, slouching over the vanity.
"I- um, corpses to match with the soul essence...?" Aurelia offers without much thought.
Lili pokes her head outside the vanity, tears all dried up and brows mushed in horror. "Aurelia Mossbloom," she gasps, "you're a horrible person."
Yeah, tell her about it. Where did that thought even come from? Certainly it wasn't something she could concoct in a split second.
"Yeah- I'm sorry I ju—"
"No," Lili jumps out of the vanity and twirls around Aurelia's head. "I love you for it," she grins a toothy grin in the mushroom's face. "Go ahead, tell me everything!" She urges with bright ivy eyes, backing Aurelia against a window.
The small window is draped with sheer curtains, revealing a view of a lush, enchanted garden looming in darkness. "Oh, did I sleep for a long while? It's night already!" Aurelia exclaims, changing the subject.
"You've been out for two days," Lili deadpans.
"TWO DAYS?! I SLEPT THROUGH TWO DAYS? I FEEL LIKE YOU CHOKED ME FIVE MINUTES AGO!"
Lili coughs awkwardly, floating away from Aurelia as she mumbles, "Well, for at least one and a half day, I tried killing you multiple ti— OH MY CREATOR! I DID NOT THINK OF DROPPING YOU FROM THE ROOFTOP!" Lili snaps her head in Aurelia's direction with a sparkle of hope in her eyes.
"NO!" Aurelia screeches, "REVENGE ISN'T NICE. I WILL HELP YOU. THE BODIES! I WILL HELP YOU GET THE BODIES. THERE IS THIS THUNDER RITUAL THAT A GUILD IS GOING TO DO TOMORROW. THERE'LL BE LOADS OF CORPSES!"
"How do you know that?"
Indeed, an excellent question for Aurelia has no idea why she knows that. She has no idea of what she spoke or the authenticity that it roots from. What thunder ritual? What guild? Why was she suddenly so obsessed with providing corpses?!
"Tell me, Au-Re-Lia," Lili breaks her name in mockworthy words, "How do you know that?"
Aurelia's tongue lines over her teeth, once, twice, thrice, "So, um, because— I like seeing the ritual? They do it...every year?" She breaths out, internally stabbing her mind, heart and soul for that lame excuse.
"You like seeing the Wizardkind stand in thunder and shock themselves to death?" Lili frowns, backing away from Aurelia and eyeing her weirdly as the latter nods.
Aurelia doesn't wants to mix with the Wizardkind. They're such taboos in all species. If not killed because of The Hoarder, she'll be eradicated just for mentioning that she knows of their existence, let alone enjoys their anual game of death.
"You have some...eccentric hobbies," Lili coughs. "Excellent, we'll go tomorrow." With that, her spirit disappears through a wall.
And Aurelia exhales an anxious breath.
"What the actual rot is wrong with me?!" Aurelia gasps in mortification. She paces towards her vanity and presses her face against the mirror, checking if she was just physically another person. She wasn't. Her straight red gills for hair, her gold infused eyes, her skeletal body, it was all a testament of her true existence.
This is, very much, Aurelia Mossbloom, acting like a madwoman. "What in Creator's name is a Thunder Ritual even?! Where does it take place? What did I just spew!!" She tugs at her hair, crying to herself.
Can she run away from here?
She runs up to the window again and squishes her face against the glass. Butterflies and bioluminescent mushrooms light a winding path — or should she say, guard it? The whole castle is sentient. How can she ever run away?!
Aurelia did not die because she saw through Lili's magic in time. She had read about Spirit magic a lot during her childhood, to help herself in efficiently and non-violently capturing the soul essence of her food.
There are aggressive plantfolk like Mortiflora which will kill to live and there are those like Lili who hold inherent abilities to defend and survive. Though, everyone uses their magic differently, just like how they walk differently or talk differently — but there is always a pattern.
Catch, compell, conquer.
Lili's spirit magic was skittered in three steps. The gold dust sprinkle, building trust and tricking the consciousness of the opponent and breaking their will.
And Lili was so close to success if she hadn't reminded Aurelia of the control she had on the castle. Essentially, as a Castle Spirit, the illusion of her magic remains confined to the walls of the castle. She cannot inflict a permanent will on anyone from the outside, who knows of her powers and existence.
But it doesn't mean that Aurelia cannot be tortured to eternity's end!
"Ugh, is this considered mortal peril? Should I cross the line and ask the Hoarder? Surely, he'd know...and he wouldn't kill me," Aurelia mumbles to herself, pressed up against the wall in melancholy. "No- what if he decides that I should stay in a cell— no! What if Lili thinks I'm going to complain to the Hoarder?! Surely, she'll know about it before I can even reach him. Ugh!!"
She stamps her feet against the floor and feels annoyed when, in return, it makes her feet throb with pain.
Instantly, she feels conflicted.
Why did she do that? Stomp on the floor for no reason, whatsoever and feel annoyed when it hurt back? She wasn't this person...what was happening?
"Ugh! It's the castle! It is driving me crazy!" She wails to no one in particular, flinging back to the cloud like bed and procrastinating her own doom.