#just a couplea kitties :] nothing to see here

[swanbelly]

trying to make a style for a comic idea :]

[docholligay]

The God of Small Luck

As some of you know we get pathfnder bonus points or whatever for contributing to the story outside of the game, but this one conferred me an extra bonus: Trolling Jetty. Due to some miscommunication, her character was supposed to get Divine Favor and Zone of Truth when she leveled up but...didn’t. I argued that this was pretty much in keeping with Seth’s relationship with her deity(?) and so it became that if I wrote a fic about this happening, and she didn’t write a parry, she had to keep the spells she got. I’ve been kicking this idea around for nearly a month, and I hope you enjoy. 1800 words

Note: Shekinah (Shay) is my mom’s character, a half-elf witch. 

All her life, Seth Fuzlae had wanted to KNOW. 

Why is the sky blue? Where do the stars come from? Who was the first storyteller?  She would ask any adult who would listen, unsatisfied with any answer she received, always searching for what she considered to be the truth. Reading came as a boon to her--words always seemed more truthful when you laid them out in ink, at least they did when she was young--and so she discovered her own answers to these questions, and discovered that some of them were still waiting to be answered. 

But still, she was never satisfied. 

She became even less satisfied upon discovering that no one quite knew the answer as to why she was the chosen one, or why she would have to give her life (It always unnerved Seth that the phrase could be taken a variety of ways, and death seemed the least distressing) for this nebulous idea of a destiny. Books held no answers, and as much as she would like to have determined that it was a lie, the lack of book binding did not seem to allay the very real signs that Seth was bought to this fate, whatever it was. 

Curse. Gift. It was both, and neither, twin snakes curving around her as artfully as any caduceus, waiting to strike. 

However, Seth was no quitter, even if that was the most reasonable course of action, and so she had wrestled those snakes, tied them to her knapsack,  and gone off into the world, seeking whoever or whatever had laid this upon her, ready to demand an explanation. They would  be their own undoing, as Seth meditated and projected and incanted in all the ways she knew, and as her powers grew, she would come to fight the very thing from which her power flowed, She would deny it the meal it hoped for. 

And so, she sat across the table from her friend, she supposed it was now fair to say, who stood at the edge of the table, standing and holding her bowl of oatmeal. Even at the highest table in the human village, she was too tall for it, but Kitty seemed rather used to it by now, and, as Seth often did in the opposite direction adapted. 

“You know I love hearin’ your plans to kill God, but,” She pushed back the brim of her hat, “any particular reason it’s comin’ up the morning after we damn near got arrested?”

“Oh like we don’t almost get arrested all the time.” She scowled. 

Kitty was the only person Seth trusted with any of the truth of her past, which was irrevocably tied to her future. Kitty and she had gone along together for a long time now, and she could always count on Kitty to never pry too hard about where Seth had come from, to pretend to ignore Seth’s hand, and to never open her mouth to another human being about the things she did know. Seth treated her the same, and the bits and pieces she knew about why Kitty had left home stayed locked in her mind and in her mouth. 

But if there was to be a negative about Kitty, the first thing Seth would put on the list was a certain practicality that left little room for Seth’s sense of presentation and occasion. 

She sighed, knowing that her dramatic and eerie and, she thought, very well practiced speech was a complete waste on the centaur across from her, whose main sense of wonder came from the dried fruit in her oatmeal. 

“Because, my pearl-buttoned friend,” she looked up at Kitty, “I am on the eve of recieving more power. I can feel it, they can’t deny me any longer. And I,” She sat up straight and grinned, “am going to receive that which is due me. Knowledge, and luck.”

“Sure.” Kitty picked out a raisin. 

“You really are fortunate to have me around, I’ll be able to find out the truth from anyone we come across, and the God--Gods--power--thing that cursed me will have no choice but to grant me favor in combat, and,” she leaned forward conspiratorially, “I just MIGHT ask them to bless you with luck.” 

Kitty looked at her a moment, took a sip of her coffee, and then looked off. 

“I have a couplea questions. Or thoughts, I spose.” 

Seth tossed back her mess of hair. “I’m always here to enlighten you.” 

“Number one, luck’s a poor thing to rely on, and can’t take the place of skill or steel, Seth.” She took another sip, as if putting a final period on the thought. 

Seth took her own drink, the brightly colored foam dotting her nose. “Listen, I know you people like plows more than prophecy, but you’ve been traveling with me and Shay long enough that you can’t not believe in it.” 

Kitty shook her head. ‘Didn’t say I didn’t believe in it, said I didn’t rely on it. Number two,” she said, refusing to answer further, “I have known ya to be a good many things in my life, many of which I appreciate. Lucky’s never been on of ‘em.” 

“Yes,” Seth sighed dramatically and rolled her eyes, “That’s what this is going to address. Obviously.” 

“Right, so,” Kitty hunkered down to the table so her eyes were directly across from Seth’s, “How in hell do ya know that whatever it is that gives ya this power’s gonna give ya the power ya want? That thing ya gotta ride with doesn’t seem particularly inclined toward your preferences generally, if ya follow me.”

“Oh Kitty,” Seth laughed, “I have learned how to interact with this mystical crown which has been set upon my head, ready to struggle and do battle and to--” 

“Lord.” 

“Really wrestle with the gods themselves, and while they are not yet on the ropes, I do know how to get a punch or two in. I have done an immense amount of reading on the subject, and they’ll simply have no choice but to give me what I ask for.” 

She crossed her arms, sat back, and smiled. 

Kitty looked at her flatly. “‘Kay.” 

“Don’t say okay that way I know that means you don’t believe me I have it perfectly worked out and---” 

_________________________

That night, Seth sat at her bed, eyes closed, slowly letting the breath come in and out, as she focused her thoughts on her desires. Truth. Favor. She wove her will throughout the words, tying them into herself like ribbons of a maypole, over and under and around, until she was coveered completely in the weavings of the magic. 

It would come. She knew this, as she squeezed the stone in her hand, the one Kitty had shook her head as she traded several gold for. Kitty couldn’t possibly have known the way this would guide the divine will of the god, or gods, or whatever her patron and pursuer happened to be. In her other hand was a brightly colored feather, something she’d picked up weeks ago but had come to use as a stand-in for herself in these sort of invocations, something that felt tied to her. 

She slept, or didn’t. She dreamed, or prophesied. 

In either case, the darkness came. 

Morning came with it, following on its heels like a dog after the fox, and Seth awoke seemingly as soon as she slept. 

It had worked. She could feel a surge of power within her, some glow, as if several candles had been added to a dark hallway, and she could see so many things now laid out before her. The power was hers, and she was ready to use it. 

She had promised Kitty, early on in their friendship, that she would never get into her head without permission, and so, as Kitty stood in the corner buttoning up her shirt, she wouldn’t use her newfound powers of truth. She was a gnome of honor, and of her word. 

But she had never promised Kitty that she would not use her powers at all, and so her hand moved to the pistol laid on the table, trying not to grin as she did so. She would shoot Kitty’s hat off, without harming her, just a gentle blow-by on the brim, and Kitty would see that she had this new power, this luck Kitty claimed she never had, and then Kitty would laugh, and suggest she use this in some cheap and low way, like for dice. 

Okay, maybe Seth would use it for dice too, but not right AWAY. 

Seth closed her eyes, focusing her energy on the new power inside of her, hands gripping the pistol tightly. Luck. Luck. Luck. She heard the words spin her head, the words that she would bring forth to call this in future, written on her mind like the ink she had loved as a child, and she felt her body vibrate with energy and power. 

She fired. 

The next half-second was not exactly as Seth had seen it. The shot went off, and Seth was blown backward into the side of the bed. Kitty’s hat shot off as she ducked, swearing furiously, a hole appearing right at the edge of the crown where Kitty’s head had been moments before. There was a bright ping as the bullet ricocheted off the stone wall, and headed right back for Seth, who could do nothing but watch in horror as it came to her chest. 

There was another clink as it bounced off, and under the bed. 

“WHAT IN THE FULL HELL UNDER THE MARE’S MOON ARE YA DOING?!” Kitty looked at her with wild eyes, her finger through the hole in her hat. 

“I”M SUPPOSED TO BE LUCKY NOW!!” Seth stood up. “BUT--”

“DAMN RIGHT YOU’RE LUCKY, LUCKY I DON’T KILL YA WHERE YA STAND!” 

“Girls!” Shay was at the door, her dress flowing and her hair coiffed already, in her strange, elegant sense, “What is going on in here?”

“Seth tried to shoot me, near’s I can figure.” She jammed the tarnished hat on her head and scooped the pistol off the ground. 

“No! I mean,” she paused, “Yes, but not--” She looked to Shay as if she were a child explaining to her mother, “I got new powers last night! I was supposed to--” 

“Oh yes!” Shay patted her hands together excitedly, “Ironskin! I see! How lovely, but if I could suggest you NOT try new spells with--” 

“WHAT??” Seth looked down, and there it was shimmering iron haze about her skin, unbending, “no...I was supposed to get--you have to be kidding me” She closed her eyes and focused on truth, temporarily forgetting her promise to Kitty, and then opened them, “Kitty, did you sleep with that girl back in Nelesee?” 

“None of your goddamn business, and also--” 

Seth angrily shoved at the side table next to her, slamming it into the wall. 

“Oh!” Shay chirped excitedly “Bull’s Strength! How useful!” 

Seth moaned and sank to the floor. All her life Seth Fuzlae had wanted to know the answers t every question, but in the particular moment, there was only one:

Why me?