Chapter 52: Profits Before Pitchforks

Lucien heads to the front desk to book a room for the night, digging through his pockets for the last of his loose coin, when Serenith’s stomach growls. Loud enough, sudden enough, that a passing server actually turns to look.

"You okay?" he asks, glancing up.

"No," she says flatly, arms crossed, hovering a foot off the ground with the particular stillness of someone holding onto their patience by a thread. "You’ve been so busy plowing through an entire brothel’s worth of beast-kin that you’ve completely, thoroughly neglected my dietary needs. I haven’t eaten a proper meal since this morning."

He gasps, stricken, both hands flying to his chest. "I am so sorry. I’ve been distracted."

"You’re always distracted. Especially around pretty women. It’s practically a permanent condition at this point."

"To be fair, Val did consume an entire kitchen. I barely ate either."

"Feed me!"

He digs out a handful of gold, already opening his mouth to apologize further, but she snatches it straight from his palm before he can finish the sentence.

"I’ll handle it myself." she says flatly and floats off toward the kitchen, muttering something under her breath about mortals and their utterly useless priorities.

"W-Wait, Serenith. I’m sorry. Let me—" He starts after her, apologies still tumbling out one after another, but Val’s hand closes around his shoulder, heavy and firm, holding him in place.

"Don’t bother, " Val says, grabbing his shoulder "Some fires are better left to burn themselves out. Let her fill her stomach, she’ll forget why she was angry in the first place."

They head up to their room instead, following a narrow, creaking staircase to a small, plain space at the end of the hall.

It was a quint, plain, a two bed corner suit with a washbasin and far too many different smells. A far cry from Kamiko’s smoke-and-silk opulence, or his Royal residences in the Ashlands, but honest, and blessedly quiet after the day they’ve had.

Val throws himself onto the nearest bed like a felled tree, springs groaning loud in protest under his weight, one boot still dangling off the edge.

Lucien settles in more leisurely, dropping onto the second bed, sitting up against the headboard with his hands laced behind his head, staring out the narrow window at the darkening village below.

Lanterns flickering on one by one along the main street, smoke curling lazily from a dozen chimneys, the whole scene settling into the particular hush of a town winding down for the night.

He looks, for the moment, thoroughly satisfied with how the day turned out.

He turns to Val, who’s already half-asleep, eyes drooping, and starts running through the details of the deal with Kamiko anyway. How eager she seemed, how much potential the whole arrangement carries, the specific numbers he’s already sketching out in his head for the first shipment.

Val lifts one tired hand without opening his eyes, waving vaguely in Lucien’s direction.

"Great. Genuinely. It’ll also be a surprise if you survive tomorrow."

Lucien pauses mid-sentence. "What’s that supposed to mean?"

Val stretches, arms reaching high overhead, back arching against the mattress, and farts, long and resonant, hard enough to rattle the bed frame and set the washbasin trembling on its stand.

Lucien gasps, clamps both hands over his nose, and lunges for the window, wrenching the shutters open and sticking his whole head out into the cool night air, gasping like a drowning man.

"Not funny! I might actually die before morning! I have plans, Val! Business plans!"

Val chuckles, deep and thoroughly delighted with himself, rolling over onto his side to face Lucien.

"The was funny. Farts are very funny, actually. But it wasn’t what I meant... you keep telling people you’re the Demon Lord. Loudly. Repeatedly. Someone’s going to believe you eventually."

"So?" Lucien says, voice muffled, still half out the window.

"So demon lords aren’t exactly welcome outside the Ashlands. Doubt the locals will take the announcement well, once it actually sinks in properly."

Lucien scoffs, pulling his head back in just far enough to glare at him. "I’m not the demon lord of old. I’m different. I want people to know that... that’s the entire point of everything I’m building here."

Val stretches again, and Lucien yells at him not to, already scrambling backward, too late.

Another fart, louder and considerably more sustained than the first, rolls out across the room, and Lucien gags theatrically out the window while Val wheezes with helpless laughter behind him, wiping actual tears from the corners of his eyes.

Serenith chooses that exact, unfortunate moment to pop back into the room, cheerful, both hands resting on a visibly satisfied stomach.

She sees Lucien halfway out the third floor window, and tilts her head in confusion.

"What," she asks, far too late, "are you do—"

It hits her like a physical wall, and she gags, flails, claps both hands over her nose, and cracks her head hard on the doorframe in her scramble to get back out, wings beating uselessly against the low ceiling as she flees the room entirely.

"I’m reporting this!" she shouts back, still gagging. "This is workplace harassment!"

Val’s laughter rattles the rafters behind her, loud enough that a passing server downstairs actually pokes her head up the staircase just to check the roof isn’t about to collapse.

Lucien wakes the next morning to a sharp, deliberate poke in the ribs.

He blinks his eyes open slowly, disoriented, to find Serenith looming directly over him, backlit by early morning sun through the narrow window.

"Best thing I’ve woken up to in weeks," he says, grinning, still half-asleep.

She slaps him. Open palm, sharp, entirely unamused.

"Get up. We have guests."

"I only accept slaps like that during sex." He scowls, rubbing his stinging cheek, sitting up slowly. "There are rules about this!"

She doesn’t dignify that with a response, instead grabbing his scalp with one hand and forcibly turning his head toward the window.

Below, the entire village has gathered outside the inn. A churning sea of fur, feathers, scales, and horns, all packed shoulder to shoulder in the street, torches lit despite the bright mid-morning sun, pitchforks and rusty farm tools raised high like an army mustering for war.

Someone near the back is banging two pots together with grim enthusiasm.

A small child sits perched on her father’s shoulders, waving a tiny stick with a scrap of red cloth tied to the end, apparently under the sincere impression she’s carrying a proper battle flag into glorious combat.

The whole scene carries the unmistakable, chaotic energy of a mob that formed considerably faster than anyone present actually agreed to.

"DEMON LORD! COME OUT! DEMON LORD! COME OUT!" They demand, in ragged unison.

Lucien rubs his eyes hard, squints down at the assembled crowd, and lets out a low, genuinely impressed whistle.

"They brought pitchforks. Actual pitchforks. I’m kinda flattered."

Val groans awake behind them. "What’s with the infernal commotion every single night?"

"It’s morning." Serenith says flatly.

"Looks like we’re about to be the main attraction at a public execution." Lucien adds causally.

Val hauls himself upright, shuffles to the window beside Lucien, glances down at the mob, and chuckles, thoroughly, genuinely entertained by the sight of an entire village showing up before breakfast just to threaten his business partner.

"Told you so." he snorts.

"Told you so~" Lucien mutters mockingly, already scanning the room for something resembling armor and finding nothing but bedsheets.

Luckily Val only snarls at him in response.

"You actually going to help this time?"

Val burps, long and thoroughly unbothered, and stretches out lazily across the mattress like a cat claiming a particularly good patch of sunlight.

"Nah." Val shrugs, "No saving stupid demon lords before breakfast. It’s a rule. Ancient. Well respected."

"You made that rule up two seconds ago, I watched you do it."

"Doesn’t make it less of a rule."

Lucien sneers at him, already halfway to the door, tugging his shirt on over his head as he goes. "Worst business partner I’ve ever had."

"And the richest, most powerful, handsomest, certainly," Val mutters, entirely too pleased with himself, and reaches lazily under his bed for a plate of basilisk balls he’d smuggled up from last night’s dinner.