#TRENT IKITHON TAKE MY BOYS NAME OUT IF YOUR FUCKING MOUTH

[luminousstardust]

ESSEK MENTION MOODBOARD

[iatethepomegranate]

We are not alone in the dark with our demons, Chapter 7

In which Caleb buys a house in Rexxentrum with Beau and Yasha, becomes a professor, is loved a lot by the Nein (including lots of Shadowgast in most chapters), and fights to protect vulnerable people from going through what he did.

Chapter summary: Time is of the essence. Caleb cannot let it end this way. He will not let more lives be ruined by Trent Ikithon.

Notes: CW: Caleb's backstory but REALLY BAD, references to child abuse, vomiting

More detailed warnings and a chapter summary can be found in the end notes on AO3.

If you need to skip, you can probably read up to Caleb telling Beau to use Step of the Wind. There is a reference to past child abuse a few lines above that. If that's an issue, stop reading as soon as Caleb flags down a villager.

Chapter title is from Eight by Sleeping At Last again.

****

Chapter 7: For the innocent, for the vulnerable, I'll show up on the front lines with a purpose

They landed. The stormclouds were heavy overhead. Caleb hadn’t witnessed a storm in Blumenthal for a long time, and it disoriented him.

“Caleb, which way’s north?” asked Beauregard.

He grounded himself, breathed, pointed. Beauregard angled herself in a northeastern direction and started off. He followed close behind; Astrid and Wulf were half a step behind him on either side.

Caduceus had mentioned an orchard. Caleb had his head on a swivel, but he couldn’t see any fruit trees. And the buildings seemed slightly… off.

Oh. Oh no.

Caleb felt sick.

“Wait,” said Astrid. “We’re in the wrong place.”

Caleb held himself very still, silently counting eins, zwei, drei, fier, fünf… “Okay.” He breathed deeply. “Around me, please.”

Of all the times for a teleport to send them off-target. He wanted to scream, but instead, he focused hard on every little detail Caduceus had provided. And he cast again.

Again, they landed. The orchard trees were in sight. Caleb pointed them in the right direction again. The road was muddy, squelching as they ran. There were a handful of people still in the street, making last-minute preparations for the storm, and they definitely looked askance at a group of (somewhat) strangers tearing down the street.

“Astrid, what’s the name of the family?” asked Caleb.

“Baumann.”

Caleb caught the nearest villager who didn’t look too freaked out, switching to Zemnian. “Excuse me. My name is Caleb Widogast. I am a teacher at Soltryce Academy. We are looking for the Baumann family.”

The man he had stopped looked him up and down for far longer than Caleb could stand under the circumstances. “What’s your business?”

“We need to discuss Nico’s tuition this year,” said Astrid. “He was set to graduate, but the seniors may need additional support after the departure of Master Ikithon.” She held out her hand. “Archmage Astrid Beck. I am Ikithon’s replacement.”

“All right. What’s the rush?”

Caleb sighed, because he had to let something out. “I had not wanted to speak of this in public, but if we must… Master Ikithon was arrested a few months ago for abusing his students. Nico and Felix have been missing since just before the arrest. We have located Felix, but we have concerns about Nico. This is time-sensitive.”

“This Master Ikithon did something to the boys?” The man’s face didn’t give much away, but he pointed down the street. “Head to the end of the road, turn right, and keep going until you see the house with the cabbage patch.”

“Thank you.”

They ran. That had taken far too much time. Caleb should have been pulled the abusive teacher card from the beginning. Fuck.

“Beauregard, Step of the Wind? We three can fly.”

“Got it.”

Caleb, Wulf and Astrid cast Fly on themselves, and Beau began to fucking book it. She was technically faster than them, even with flight, but she only pulled a little ahead. If they were too late, there wasn’t much she could do alone.

There was an odd scent in the air. Caleb wasn’t sure if he was imagining it, until Beau yelled over her shoulder, “I smell smoke!”

They turned the corner and pushed onwards, and soon it became clear looking for cabbages was the least of their problems. There was a house on fire.

Time stretched, before Caleb breathed and it snapped like a bowstring. They were coming up fast, and there was barely any more time to think.

“Wulf, find the boy,” Caleb said. “We’ll get inside.”

“I see him.” Wulf broke off towards a barn, where there was a young man half-hidden, staring at the flames. There was no time to determine his condition; that had to be up to Wulf.

They reached the house. There was a thick plank of wood jammed against the door handle. Caleb cast Telekinesis, threw it out of the way.

Beau charged ahead.

“Wait!”

Beau stopped. Caleb used the spell to throw the door open, and there was an explosion of flame outward, which would have hurt. Belatedly, rushing to open the door may have been a mistake, but there was no time to think about it. They raced inside and crouched low, coughing from the smoke. They could barely see, aside from flickers of orange light all around them. The heat was unbearable.

“I’ll start on the fire,” said Astrid, throwing out a Ray of Frost at the staircase. Aside from the roaring of the flames, there were not the noises Caleb could remember. It was almost… too quiet.

Beau got out her fan. “Split up?”

“I’ll go upstairs.” It would be safer for him to go. He could control the flames better than she could with her limited-use fan, or her Belabour. Best to keep her close to Astrid. “Be careful of backdrafts.”

She punched his shoulder and crawled deeper into the house, while Caleb ducked towards the staircase he could barely see through the thick smoke. Nico must have expended most of his spells to have burned the house this quickly.

Caleb had to douse and climb over a fallen beam to get up the stairs, pulling his shirt over his mouth and nose for a bit of protection. He could not shake his dread.

The smoke was thicker upstairs. Caleb’s eyes watered. He tamped down what flames he could see with his Control Flames cantrip. His hand found a doorframe. Door open, no backdraft risk. He peeked inside, squinting against the roiling smoke. But he couldn’t see far enough for just a glance. He cast Control Flames again, pushing down as much flame as he could.

He crawled inside the room, his hands quickly finding the frame of a single bed. Probably Nico’s. He felt around for a moment longer to be sure, but it was unlikely anyone was here. He moved on, coughing hard enough to tear his throat. His eyes streamed from the smoke. He cast again. But it would take time for the smoke to clear, even as the flames slowly dwindled around him.

Caleb crawled down the hallway, finding another doorframe. Felt for the door. Closed. Rested the back of his hand against it. Hot. Opening it was too risky without improving the conditions up here. Even if he was safely away from the backdraft by using telekinesis, if someone was on the other side of the door, they could get hurt.

Caleb aimed a Disintegrate spell for the ceiling above him and hoped it would punch a hole all the way through. Memories of what to do in a fire were slowly filtering through his scattered mind. Vertical ventilation mattered in a building fire.

He let the spell loose, and it punched a hole the size of Caleb’s head all the way into the sky. A horrible thought occurred to him, even as smoke began to escape and oxygen equalise, slow as it was.

Caleb knew a lot about fire. In a situation where a backdraft was possible, it was highly unlikely to find survivors. Caleb tamped down the flames around him again, which had grown with the presence of more oxygen.

Then he stepped back and Disintegrated the door, taking a huge chunk of it away. He kicked the jagged remains open and crawled into the room. Control Flames once more.

He reached out, and found a shape on the floor. Edged closer. A hand. Blackened. It twitched, and then fell still. Caleb gently felt the wrist for a pulse. Couldn’t find one.

He edged around the charred body, and found a second one. There were no discernible features left. Just a vague human shape, burned to a crisp.

Caleb flung out his Control Flames cantrip again, dousing the flames in the room. Then, he pulled out his copper wire. “Beauregard, call off the search. They are dead. Get outside. Astrid and I will finish putting it out.”

Beauregard’s reply was instant, raspy. “Okay. I’ll check on Eadwulf. Don’t take too long.”

Caleb was thankful she didn’t say anything else. He kept working his way through the upper floor, snuffing the flames until all that remained was smoke slowly curling towards the hole in the roof. His throat was raw from coughing. Fire gone, he opened all the windows he could find to help ventilate the building and make it safer for Astrid downstairs.

He found her in the kitchen, icing the flames over. “I heard.” Her voice was equally shredded.

Caleb wordlessly helped her put the rest of the flames out. They stepped out of the house. Beauregard had reached Wulf by now, who was kneeling in the grass, cradling Nicolaus.

They approached. Nico’s eyes were glazed over, unfocused, and he lay limp in Wulf’s arms. Astrid twitched.

“He got a little aggressive, but I handled it,” said Wulf. “Now he’s…” He looked up at Caleb. “Like you were.”

A muscle was working in Beauregard’s jaw, but whatever was on her mind, she said something else. “Take me back to the office and bring Caduceus. I’ll watch Felix.”

“Astrid,” Caleb said flatly, “do you have any teleports left?”

“Ja.” She approached Beauregard, moving stiffly. “I’ll be back.” She and Beauregard vanished.

Wulf gazed up at Caleb, his face serious but giving little away as it often did. “Lionett told me what you said.”

Caleb took a deep breath, which itched terribly, forcing him to cough again. “We have one thing left to try. It’s… a long shot.” He knelt in front of Nico, who did not react to his presence. “Do you…” He coughed again. “In your experience with me, do you know if he might…”

“You would sometimes react to things,” said Wulf. “Not often. I don’t know if you could make sense of anything we said. Astrid said you don’t remember anything?”

“I do not.” Caleb sighed; if there was even the slightest chance Nico could hear them, he had to say something. He switched to Zemnian, in case that would be easier for him to process on the off-chance he heard anything. “Nico, my name is Caleb, or Bren. Either is fine. I know you are not well at the moment, but we are going to help you. I promise we will help you.”

There was no reaction. Caleb hadn’t really expected one. Wulf certainly hadn’t. They caught each other’s eyes again over Nico’s head. Wulf’s expression cracked, just a tiny bit. Caleb breathed deep, and Wulf did the same.

Caleb coughed again. Breathing really hurt.

Astrid appeared with Caduceus a few feet away.

Caleb got up, every part of him aching. His fingers were blistered. “Caduceus, let us walk and talk.”

“You do not have to go back in there,” Astrid said.

“I know. I am choosing to go.” Caleb pulled his Transmuter’s Stone from his pocket. “I have a trick I want to try.”

Her eyes fell to the ground. “All right.”

Caleb turned back to the house. Blackened. Smoking. But the flames were gone. He led Caduceus across the ash-spotted grass.

“Beau said it was bad,” said Caduceus.

“It is bad.” Caleb cleared his throat, painfully. “Will you be all right here?”

Caduceus nodded. “We both know I’m not the one to worry about.” He cast a low-level Cure Wounds on Caleb as they walked, and his throat and fingers felt a bit better.

Caleb went through the front door first. A fair amount of smoke had cleared by now, but the acrid scent of burnt wood remained. They headed up the stairs; Caleb used Telekinesis to move the fallen beams.

Light streamed into the upstairs from the opened windows and the hole in the roof. Caduceus looked up at the hole.

“Huh. You did that?”

“Vertical ventilation reduces backdraft risk.” Caleb led Caduceus to the second bedroom. Now that enough smoke had cleared out, he could see the reality of the room, the blackened double bed, compromised dresser, scorched mirror, the two charred human bodies on the floor, closer to the door than he had realised. And a very familiar stench of burned flesh.

Caleb swallowed against nausea, and knelt beside the smaller of the two bodies. “I can try to Raise Dead with my stone. Like Molly. I can only do it once.”

Caduceus knelt beside the larger body, taking in the damage. “Caleb.” He was about to tell Caleb how bad the chances were that they could fix this, and he really really could not handle hearing that from him. Him specifically. Caleb could not afford to break. Not yet.

“I know.” Caleb placed his stone on the woman’s chest. He had researched the Raise Dead spell since figuring out he could use his stone in this way. He knew the spell could close all mortal wounds, but would not replace body parts or organs integral to survival. If the Baumanns had died from smoke inhalation, this would have a higher chance of success. In this state…

Unlikely. But he needed to try. Caleb poured magic into the stone. Beside him, Caduceus placed a large diamond on the other body’s chest and prayed softly to the Wildmother.

Caleb’s stone shattered, and he could feel for just a moment a catch of something. Like he had snagged the corner of the woman’s soul.

“Frau Baumann,” he muttered. “I don’t know if we knew each other when we were children. My name was Bren Ermendrud, and I am here to help your son. He needs you. And this does not have to be your end. The world will be much poorer without you in it.”

The stone glowed, and he felt the soul drifting, snagged by the spell. For a moment, the soul seemed to dip, like it wanted to return. And then, as the stone shattered, it drifted away. He tried to grasp for it, but it slipped through his magic. And then it was gone.

The body was still just a body. There was not enough left of her for him to even recognise. The air was empty. Or maybe there wasn’t any air.

Caduceus sat back, shaking blackened dust of the destroyed diamond from his fingers, and raised his eyes to the window opposite them. “Wildmother, a terrible tragedy has happened here today. This is not the natural way of things. I know this is a huge ask, but… we would like to have these people back.” He waited. A full sixty seconds passed. Nothing changed. He sighed. “I’m sorry, Caleb.”

It was done. They had tried everything they could. And everything had failed.

The nausea crashed over Caleb once again. He tried to breathe, and smelled burnt flesh. He shoved a hand over his nose and mouth, swallowing hard.

Caduceus pulled him to his feet. “Let’s step outside.” He led Caleb out of the room, down the stairs, out the front door.

Caleb gulped the fresh air down. “Go to the others. I… need a… moment.”

Caduceus squeezed his shoulder and approached the barn, where a crowd was beginning to gather. Caleb walked, tightly-controlled, around the side of the house, just out of sight, and threw up on the grass. Wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. Banged the side of his fist against the charred wood until he could think again.

Then he straightened, rolled back his shoulders, and approached the slowly-building clump of people.

Caduceus was doing most of the talking, with some input from a tense Astrid. Wulf had stood up, carrying Nico, who was still unresponsive. They were all out of teleportation spells, but Caleb had brought enough chalk and ink to draw a circle to the archives.

“All right,” Caduceus was saying. “We are going to take Nicolaus to Rexxentrum for care. I think we’re all a bit out of it after all of this.”

“Our gravekeeper will take care of the Baumanns,” said an older man, who Caleb recognised as the mayor. He’d avoided speaking to him last time he visited, so he had managed to not learn his name. “You take care of Nico, and send us updates as you can.”

“That can be arranged,” Astrid said, businesslike. “Thank you.”

“I’ll start drawing a circle to Rexxentrum,” Caleb said quietly. “May I use the barn? The chalk will vanish once we are gone.”

The mayor shrugged. “I suppose.”

Caleb stepped into the barn and cleared a ten-foot circle of hay so he could draw directly on the clay. “High Curator. It’s Caleb. May I bring Astrid and Eadwulf through the Rexxentrum circle? We will have Caduceus and a sick young man with us.”

“Hello, Professor. You may do that. If you are able to update me on your search on your way through, please do.”

Caleb would probably vomit again if he had to talk about it, but Caduceus could get the point across, probably. He knelt on the floor and began to draw the circle, honing down his focus so all he thought about was the next stroke of chalk and ink, and the specific detailing for the Rexxentrum Archives.

The others entered the barn seven minutes and thirty-two seconds into the drawing. “Caduceus, can you Send to Beauregard?”

“Can do,” Caduceus replied. “Hey. We’re coming through the Archives soon.” A pause. “She says she’s gotten Felix settled in a dormitory and is headed home to prepare for our arrival.”

“We should keep Nicolaus away from the Assembly, ja,” Astrid said quietly. “Until we think of something.”

“I have a spell for this, I think. Better to get away from here first.”

“Yudala wants an update on our way,” Caleb said.

“I’ll take care of it,” said Caduceus.

Caleb finished the last few strokes of the circle in silence. It came alight, and they stepped through.

He had to fight back the nausea again once they landed. Caduceus steadied him with a hand on his shoulder. Yudala entered the circle chamber, taking in the ash-covered group and the catatonic boy in Wulf’s arms.

“The monks have informed me the other boy is safe,” they said. “Is this as bad as it looks?”

“It is,” Caduceus replied.

“Very well.” Yudala looked at Caleb specifically; they were smart enough and had enough access to Caleb’s past specifically to put it all together. “We’ll talk later. You all look exhausted.” They turned to Astrid. “I will send a formal invitation in due time.”

“We’ll see how much it panics the Martinet first,” Astrid said without inflection.

“I have my ways around him if need be.” Yudala led them through the archive personally, letting them out into the overcast afternoon. The storm was on its way here. “Get some rest. You have earned it.”

[landofwordsandnonsense]

And Love Said No

Fandom: Critical Role Rating: Teen and Up Category: Gen Characters: Caleb Widogast, Trent Ikithon, Nott the Brave, Fjord, Caduceus Clay, Beau, Jester Additional Tags: Team as Family, Fuck Trent Ikithon, Temporary Character Death, Canon Typical Violence, everyone loves Caleb and they’re going to make him realize it, this confrontation is inevitable and I have Strong Feelings on how I want it to go, Counterspell is sexy, playing fast and loose with D&D mechanics

Fanfic Masterpost

It couldn't have been avoided forever, even he had to admit that, and it was, perhaps, no more than he deserved. And he was stronger than he'd ever been.

He needed to be, because now he was alone and face to face with the worst person in the world.

In retrospect, they probably should have known better than to plan.

It had been meant to be a quick in-and-out smash and grab at an isolated Cerberus Assembly tower not far from the Xhorhassian border. Mostly for anything Beau could send back to the Cobalt Reserve plus enough of whatever else they could carry to disguise what they’d been after. They'd planned to get in, avoid as many people as they could and incapacitate any they couldn't, then get out before anyone could do anything about it. They were stronger now, but the idea of fighting an entire tower full of Cerberus researchers and warmages wasn't an appealing one.

But of course, their plans had a history of going... awry. Occasionally, something would go approximately the way they wanted it to, but usually, that was absolutely not the case.

This plan had been irrevocably fucked since its inception because they hadn't known who was in residence. Caleb wasn't sure if they would have aborted the plan entirely and stayed away if they'd known, or if they'd have gone in intending to murder everything between them and-

They'd gotten separated, splitting off to cover as much ground as they could as quickly as possible. Nott had been with him, naturally, but while she worked on a stubborn lock he'd felt a familiar thread of magic. He hadn't entirely meant to, but he'd followed it.

It couldn't have been avoided forever, even he had to admit that, and it was, perhaps, no more than he deserved. And he was stronger than he'd ever been.

He needed to be, because now he was alone and face to face with the worst person in the world.

He was trembling from a tangle of emotions too complicated to put a name to, but certainly fear and anger made up the larger portion of it. Caleb wanted to run, but it would have done him little good. So he held his ground, not trusting himself to speak, and glared across the chamber at Trent Ikithon.

"Bren, my boy," Ikithon said in that commanding voice that had once seemed so enticing, a beacon of truth and trust, that promised power if only he'd do as he was told without question. It made Caleb's skin crawl. "I'm so pleased to see you've returned to us, healthy and whole of mind again." He'd always been good at saying the right thing, but now Caleb could hear the poison under it, the deep, sardonic evil in every word.

"That is, that is not my name anymore," Caleb snarled. His hands were clenched tight in an unsuccessful attempt to minimize the shaking. "And I, I did not... I did not return to you." It was a statement he never could have imagined uttering, not to Trent Ikithon, and if he'd had time to think about it the words would have caught in his throat. But he'd spoken without thought, and now that he'd said it he wouldn't take it back. Even if having said that to the man who had once been the center of his universe made his heart try to beat out of his chest.

Ikithon's pleasant smile vanished. "You always were too stubborn for your own good. I see I shall have to re-educate you." His hands started moving in arcane gestures. "You belong to me, Bren. I made you. I own you."

Once, that had been true. There was no denying that Bren had belonged to Trent Ikithon, mind, body and soul. But- and Caleb hadn't realized it until just now- Bren was dead. Bren had been dead for a long time. "No," he said, surprising even himself as he held up his own hands and his Counterspell unravelled the enchantment the archmage was weaving. "My name. Is Caleb. Widogast." And Caleb belonged only to the Mighty Nein. His hand started to crackle and blacken, bursting into flames.

Ikithon sneered. "You wouldn't dare attack me. I, who taught you so much, who did my best to make a weak boy strong. I, who was like a father to you. Stop making a fool of yourself and cease this meaningless posturing this instant."

For a moment, Caleb thought he was right. Even now, even after everything, there was a part of him that doubted. A part of him that thought Trent had always been right and he was simply too weak to bear it. But the fire in his hand didn't go out, and he took a step forward. "No. You will, you will never, you will never use me again. Or anyone else."

And Trent Ikithon, the man who had haunted Caleb's waking nightmare for years, the person Caleb feared most in the world, took a step back. Caleb lifted his hand, and for a timeless moment, Caleb had the unthinkable privilege of seeing something in Ikithon's eyes he'd never thought to see.

Fear.

Then the moment shattered as the pain hit. It wasn't a spell, not really, at least, it was nothing that could be counterspelled. Caleb inhaled sharply, fighting the urge to double over in agony. A countermeasure, he realized dimly. Or a contingency. He'd been unaware of it until just now. But he'd been trained to fight through the pain, to ignore mere physical discomfort if it meant accomplishing his mission. He kept his hand up, despite the way he was shaking, and reached for the fire.

Another spasm wracked him and he couldn't help dropping to one knee. His breathing was harsh and he couldn't get enough air in, and the world kept swimming in and out of focus. But even now he wouldn't back down. He tried again. The third spasm was worse than ever, and he could taste blood bubbling up in his mouth.

"You stupid boy," Ikithon hissed. "What good is a weapon that can be turned against the man who made it?" He'd recovered his self-possession once it was clear that Caleb couldn't attack him. "Did you really think I'd ever give you the capability of harming me? All you are is a defective tool that needs must be destroyed. What a waste."

Caleb fell to his knees, oddly serene through the haze of pain. He was going to die here, but he had one comfort. He wasn't Trent's, and he never would be again. Here in this moment, he wanted nothing more than to kill Trent. He wanted it more than he'd ever wanted anything in his life, up to and including a way to turn back the time. The will was there, and the fire in his hand flared brighter as he tried one last time. He wanted to do it. He genuinely wanted to kill this man.

He just.

Couldn't.

Physically.

Do it.

He choked on blood and slumped over backwards. In the end, he thought muzzily, he was his own. He had no idea what was waiting for him in the Raven Queen’s realm, doubtless nothing pleasant. But he was his own, he didn’t belong to Trent Ikithon and he couldn’t take him back.

Then Nott’s voice shrieked “NO!” Two bolts flew out of the darkness and hit Ikithon in the torso, making him stagger back.

Before he could regain his balance, three streaks of light sizzled through the air over Caleb's head. Ikithon was able to bring up a shield that caught two of them, but the third went through and Caleb could hear the strangled curse as the old man spent a few precious moments patting the flames out of his ornate robes. Fjord strode past Caleb and halted two steps in front of him, glove still smoking.

Caleb was so startled by the half-orc's sudden appearance that he was slow in noticing he hadn't fallen against the stone tiles of the floor, but was propped up against someone's chest, with an arm around him. "I've got you, Mister Caleb," Caduceus rumbled, and there was a warm surge of magic that smelled like leaf mould and tea. His vision cleared a bit and it was easier to breathe, but there was no hope of him getting to his feet just yet. Behind him, he could hear movement, but there was too much Caduceus in the way to see.

"Fjord?" Beau's voice was rough and there was a restrained fury in it that Caleb was astonished by.

"I've got them," he said quietly, never taking his eyes off of Ikithon. "Fuck him up."

With no more warning than that, there was a blur of blue off to one side, followed almost immediately by a second, and the bright pink of Jester's floating lollipop.  And maybe once he'd have tried to convince the rest of them to stay out of harm's way and let him deal with Ikithon. It was his problem, after all, and if it was a fight he couldn't win, well, he had it coming.

But he knew better now. Easier to convince the sun to rise in the west than to keep the Mighty Nein from protecting one of their own, and he was, for better or for worse, one of the Mighty Nein.

Everything became a little frenetic at that point, and Caleb could barely keep track of what was going on. Caduceus wouldn't let him up, worried that the wizard would aggravate the internal injuries he'd managed to give himself... and it wouldn't have made much difference anyway. Caleb couldn't attack Ikithon, that had been made abundantly clear... but he'd been watching Ikithon's hands, which started to twist together in arcane gestures as the girls bolted towards him. "Nein," Caleb whispered, and the Counterspell dissipated the magic before it had a chance to be anything. Beau and Jester were laying into the archmage, Beau's hands glowing with the Wildmother's light as he jerked out of the way just in time to narrowly avoid a shattered jaw. Periodically, crossbow bolts would rain down as well, but between Nott's natural stealthy nature and what was almost certainly the Traveller's blessing, even Caleb couldn't spot her.

They had, Caleb realized with dull wonder, managed to force Ikithon to go on the defensive. Between the unpredictable crossbow bolts, Beau's relentless attacks, and Jester's floating lollipop and the dull bong of Toll the Dead, he could barely get the time to cast. And when he did, Caleb was waiting.

His head was enough in the game that he recognized the somatic components of the spells as Ikithon started to cast.

Charm Person. "Nein..." Counterspell.

Sleep. "Nein." Counterspell.

Feeblemind. "Nein."

He didn't recognize that one, it was one he hadn't learned but it looked indescribably nasty. "NEIN."

Ikithon whirled, throwing up a Shield at the last moment to block a devastating blow from Jester's spiritual weapon. His urbane, controlled mask had fallen, and he was nearly unrecognizable with his face twisted in rage and fury. "You dare!" he screamed. "You who were born nothing and will die nothing! I made you, and you are mine to destroy!" He pulled his hand back, and flung a fistful of crackling death directly at Caleb.

Fjord had been keeping out of the fight, standing protectively in front of Caleb and Caduceus, but he moved then. He threw his arm out, and his shield glinted with an otherworldly light as it caught the spell and sent it careening away to impact harmlessly on the wall. Then he grabbed the spiral-carved seashell hanging innocently from a cord around his neck. "Stop," he said in a quiet, commanding tone that could not be argued with.

And Trent Ikithon's body locked up.

Jester darted forward with her hands filled with necrotic energy laced with green. She grabbed Ikithon and he bellowed in rage and pain. Then the Hold Person failed, and he jerked in her hands. Lightning crackled against her before Caleb could do anything about it. He made an incoherent sound of rage, and the only reason he didn't forget himself and try to set Ikithon alight then and there was Caduceus's gently restraining grip. By some miracle neither Jester nor Beau had taken a hit yet but that couldn't last and he knew that but like hell was Caleb going to let this monster ruin his family the way he ruined him...

"Just trust us, Mister Caleb," Caduceus said softly. "We've faced worse." Caleb made a breathless, hysterical noise at that. Hard to imagine anything worse-

There was a startled squeak as the lightning discharged, then Duplicity vanished with a soft pop.

If Beau had been furious before, she was enraged now, in a way that rivaled Yasha in the heat of battle. "Fuck you," she snarled. Of course, they all tended to get offended when anyone targeted Jester, so that wasn't surprising. What was surprising was what she said next. "You don't get to talk about my brother like that, you son of a fuck." Before he could sneer a response, her fist slammed into his spine hard enough he went down to one knee, and whatever spell he'd been trying to cast fizzled as his arms went limp.

"Do you- do you even know what you are protecting?" Ikithon snapped. "Do you know what he's done? Who he's ki-"

"Yeah. I do." Beau crossed her arms as two more crossbow bolts found their mark and Ikithon cried out. "I know exactly what you made him into and what you convinced him was the right thing to do about it. And it doesn't fucking matter."

"We've all done super shitty things," Jester said as she appeared out of the darkness. "And we've killed a lot of people. We love him and we don't care! You don't even care, you're just trying to make us hate him!" Green light flared in her hands and he fell to his other knee when it hit him and he screamed.

"You've lost," Beau said in a dangerously soft voice. "There's hell to pay and we've come to collect. We didn't know you'd be here today, but we were always going to come for your ass. And I really hope there's a special place in the Nine Hells all set up just for you."

The reality of the situation seemed to hit Ikithon all at once. He couldn't teleport away or even run; he'd used a lot of magic already and Caleb was waiting with at least three more Counterspells. He was barely alive at this stage, after the damage the girls had done. And it was plain to anyone with eyes or ears that they weren't going to let him walk away. For the first time, he was faced with his own mortality and realized that for all of his cunning and all of his planning, this ragtag bunch of barely functional assholes had beaten him. "There may be a place in the Nine Hells marked for me," he growled. "But I won't be going there alone." Then a Word rumbled through the air. It didn't matter that a crossbow bolt immediately sank into his eye or that Beau almost instantly snapped his neck, because the Word had already been spoken.

And Caleb choked before slumping lifelessly in Caduceus's arms.

----------------------------------------

Wind whipped around him, and nothing seemed to stabilize long enough for him to make out any details. Pink and blue and green flared, and he didn't know if he should be comforted or afraid. Then purple added to the mix and even though his surroundings were still a chaotic mess, the sound of the wind died away and gave him space to think.

'I like this person, right now, is a good person, a fine person.... That person is dead, and not- It's just a person who had this body. They abandoned it...'

A sensation he couldn't identify ghosted across his forehead. 'Time for that later.'

----------------------------------------

"-leb! Caleb!"

There was a small weight in his lap, and he blinked dazedly at the blurs of green and blue and pink that surrounded him before they resolved into the rest of the Nein clustered around him. He was still half in Caduceus's lap, with Jester kneeling on the other side and Fjord looking at him upside down from somewhere above his head. Nott was crouched on top of him, her claws caught in his coat and tears running down her face. Beau was a little distance away, taut as a wire and worrying at her thumbnail.

Caleb took a rattling breath and coughed. Then he shifted a little, and became aware of the dull shards of useless stone scattered across his chest and the floor around him. Nott's reaction was immediate. "Caleb!" She threw her arms around his neck and clung to him like she'd never let go again. It practically knocked what little air he had out of him, but that didn't stop him from slowly putting his own arms around her in a shaky hug.

Over her shoulder, Caduceus gave him a surprisingly relieved smile. "Welcome back, Mister Caleb."

Jester clutched at one of his hands tightly. Her eyes were red, and there were still tear tracks down her face. "Caleb! I'm so so sorry we didn't kill that dickhead sooner! We should have- we let him-"

He managed to squeeze her fingers slightly. "It is, it is all right, blueberry. I was..." He trailed off, then offered her a brittle half-smile. "I had long... come to terms with... the idea that... I would.... I would have to die... to... to be free of him."

Fjord's hand came down on his shoulder and squeezed comfortingly. "He can't hurt you again. We made sure of that. You or anyone else."

"...Ja. Ja. That is... that is gut. Th.... thank you..." He wouldn't ask. They'd done so much for him, more than he'd ever dreamed, it would be churlish to ask. He trusted them, after all, and if they said it was so, then-

Beau understood him better than most, though, and she saw something in his shadowed eyes that even Nott didn't. So after a few minutes, while everyone clung to him and reassured themselves he was alive, she stepped forward. "C'mere." She reached down to give him a hand up, gently shooing Nott off of him and taking his hand from Jester. They obligingly moved, and she hauled Caleb up like he weighed nothing at all. She pulled one arm around her neck and held onto it, and put her other arm around his waist. He probably could have kept his feet without the support, but for once in his life he wasn't going to protest the contact.

No one said anything as she kept hold of him, walking him over to the center of the room. Trent Ikithon's body was lying in an unceremonious, inert heap. It was impossible to tell what had killed him, the crossbow or Jester's magic, or the extremely comprehensive beating Beau had dished out. Maybe it didn't matter. But seeing it... that made it real. Caleb took a shuddering breath, then closed his eyes for a moment. "You okay, man?" Beau asked quietly.

"...No. But... but perhaps... I will be. In time. With... with help." He didn't look at her as he said it, but he didn't have to.

She squeezed the hand she'd pulled over her shoulder. "You've got it," she said. "We're here to catch you."

"I know." And funnily enough, he did. He was surprised to realize he actually believed her. "Beauregard?"

"Yeah?"

"...I would, I would be honored. To call you my sister."

Her dark skin flushed a little and she looked away. But he could tell she was pleased. "You ready to get out of here?"

Caleb looked down at his free hand for a moment. Beau didn't jump when the flames licked out of his palm to cover it, but she did raise an eyebrow. He stared at his hand for a heartbeat longer, then looked at the body on the floor. This time, there was no pain, nothing prevented him from casting Fire Bolt. And when the body burst into flames there was no reaction after all. Caleb sagged against Beau. A weight had lifted off of him, so heavy that its absence was a physical thing that left him disoriented. "It's over," he murmured. "It's finally over."

"Yeah. Come on, we stole a bunch of shit you should look at."

He gave her a breathless little laugh, and let her help him out of the room, with the others trailing behind. It was, he thought, a good way to start the rest of his life.

[conceptstage]

A Marriage of Convenience {Chapter Eleven}

Caleb was pacing around the lower level of the library, fidgeting with his fingers. He took a deep breath and then summoned Frumpkin out of the ether. He held the cat close and ran his fingers up and down the cat’s spine as it purred in his arms. “I’m sorry I’ve kept you away,” he whispered into his cat’s fur. “I just need you right now.”

He pet his cat in silence for a few minutes before his silence was shattered by a heavy thump as Beau jumped down from the top level and landed a few feet away from him. “Where the fuck did that cat come from?” she asked, confused.

Caleb frowned and turned so that the cat was facing away from her. “This is my cat. His name is Frumpkin. He can disappear when I need him to. I’m just feeling… Well, I needed him to comfort me.” Beau was looking intently at the cat and Caleb suddenly realized that, other than the horses that pulled the carriage, there were no animals at the estate. “Do you want to pet him?” he asked, hesitantly holding the cat out towards her.

She reached out and slowly unrolled her fingers. She sat her hand on the cat’s head and he rubbed up against it, purring loudly at her. She smiled slightly and started to slowly pet his head. She cleared her throat and shook her head, snatching her hand back to her side. “Don’t distract me. You said you were going to tell me the truth.”

Caleb nodded and looked around like he was double checking that they were alone. He poofed his cat away and Frumpkin disappeared in a flash of light. He moved over to take a seat in an upholstered chair in the corner. Beau rolled her eyes but moved over to sit the twin chair next to him. “I’m going to tell you the story of how I murdered my parents.” He hadn’t spoken about this in years, even Nott only knew he blamed himself for their deaths and not that he was the one who actually did it. He looked up to see Beau’s reaction but she was just watching him evenly. “When I was younger, I grew up in a small township outside of Rexxentrum called Blumenthal. My mother’s name was Una. My father’s name was Leofric. Everyone was very excited about me when I was young. I was bright and confident. People used to say that I glided through life and everything just worked for me. As I got older, it became clear that I had a knack for the arcane. Everyone talked about this Soltryce Academy, maybe I would go there someday. The way they do things at that Academy, they don’t take all comers, they look for the diamond in the rough and every couple of years they find one. But when I was a young man, adolescent, really, they found three of us.” He looked at Beau again but her face hadn’t changed. He continued. “Anyway, we went there. I studied for a year. I worked so hard. It came easier to me than the other two, but they were also very accomplished. There were other students from other parts of the Empire there, and a little over a year of learning all they had to impart, I met a man named Trent Ikithon. He became our teacher.”

“I know that name.” She said suddenly. Her brows furrowed in concentration. “He came to a party last year. My parents made me meet him.”

Caleb ignored her and pushed his way through the story. “After a year of studying in the main school, Trent handpicked all three of us again, and we left the school proper and went with him to a home out in the countryside where he trained us. It was a good time. We believed in the Empire, we were going to keep it strong. He was cruel. He hurt us a lot. Made us go through extreme circumstances, but we got strong. I also fell in love, but that’s another story.”

“Another student?” The description of Trent reminded her uncomfortably of her father.

He cleared his throat and nodded. “Yeah. We rose through the ranks and it was the Empire over all, and eventually, he wanted to test our allegiance, so strangers were brought in– traitors. Disgusting people, traitors to this empire, and we killed them.” He looked up at her again and her brow was still furrowed but she didn’t seem enraged or disgusted with him yet. “Then he did it again. And again. And we killed them again and again.”

“He made you executioners?”

“We wanted to be.”

She opened her mouth to speak again but paused and scratched idly at her hairline. “Damn. I thought my life was fucked up.” She cleared her throat. “And one day he brought in your parents, right?”

“No. We were ready to graduate, and the last test of our allegiance was– I’m getting ahead of myself. I went on a trip home and visited my parents and when I was there, in the middle of the night, I awoke and overheard them talking, and went to the stair and listened to them talk about revolution and tearing the Empire down, and I felt disgrace and shame for my family. My mother and my father, who were so wonderful to me when I was a child, and were so happy for me to go to the Academy and believe in the Empire so much. I went back to the school and when the three of us were summoned and told what was expected of us, I knew what had to be done. We went to this other boy’s home first, Eodwulf, and we stood by as he killed his parents. We went to Astrid’s house, and had dinner with them, and she poisoned them. Then we went to my home and we grabbed a horse cart, and in the middle of the night, placed it against the door to the home and I set it on fire.”

“This was a loyalty test,” she said, looking at him now. “You had to do this to graduate?”

“Yes.”

“What happened then?”

He shrugged. “I graduated. I worked in research and development for a while and about a year ago I was made a teacher. They were talking about making me… become a mentor.”

“Like Trent.”

“Like Trent. They wanted me to start picking students and I realized I’d run out of time.”

“Time for what?”

“Ever since the night I killed my parents… When I heard them scream I realized that I was wrong. That I was fucked up, as you would say. I tried to run in to help them but the other students held me back. Ever since then I’ve been planning and researching to find a way to…” he paused and looked away.

“To go back,” she said. “You want to go back.”

“I discovered about a year ago a book called ‘Calamatis’. There’s no known author and only one surviving copy. I have reason to believe that it’s in your father’s possession. When they asked me to start mentoring I decided to pull some strings, get your mother to invite me here, and find the book.”

Beau frowned thoughtfully. “If he does have something like that it won’t be in here, that’s for damn sure. He collects acane things, weird shit, and he keeps it all locked away in his secret study.” She moved to stand up and he reached out to grab her arm.

“So you’ll help me?” he asked, shocked. “You’ll help me find the book even after-”

“Well, yeah, I said I would didn’t I? Caleb,” she sighed and rubbed her forehead. “I’m really not the best person for this. He’s hurting people. You just told me, you realize you have a responsibility now.”

“Which is?”

“To take that mother fucker down!”

“That’s why I need that book.”

She frowned. “Is that book gonna take him down?” she asked. “Is that really why you want it?”

“Among other things.”

“What are you hoping is in this book?”

He sighed and met her eyes. “Anybody can make lights. Anybody can send a message through wire. I want to bend reality to my will.”

“Do you realize how much responsibility that is? You really want to have that much power?”

“Are you going to help me or not?”

She started to say something but groaned in frustration and turned away. Caleb started planning the quickest way out of town but she turned back to him and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I’ll help you get the fucking book.”

“And obviously, please keep this secret.”

“Who the fuck am I going to tell?” He gave her a serious look and she waved dismissively. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll keep it secret. It’s nothing to be ashamed of though.” His own laughter surprised him and she gave him a sad look. He hadn’t thought that Beau’s face was capable of making that kind of face. “We’ll figure this out.” She started towards one of the ladders that lead up to the top but they both froze when library door was thrown open violently.

Caleb had a spell called to his fingers before he realized it but let it fall away when he recognized Jester’s face.

“Beau?” she called, gasping and leaning against the railing. “Beau!”

Beau stepped away from the ladder and into her line of sight. “Jes? What’s the matter?”

“Molly! Molly and Yasha! Your parents had the entire carnival arrested!” She hurried over to the nearest ladder and climbed down to her. “Like my mother! They got arrested for kidnapping you!”

“What, all of them?”

Jester made it to the bottom and was gasping to catch her breath as she stopped in front of her friend, shaking her head. “Gustav, the flashy elf guy you saved? He was convicted of the kidnapping, like my momma. No bail, in jail for life. Everyone else they called accessories to kidnapping. Five years.”

Beau frowned. “How much is bail for the whole lot?”

“4000 gold for everyone. 200 each.”

Beau bit her lip and turned to stare out the window. “Shit,” she hissed.

“We have to help them, right? They helped save you, they came back for you.”

Beau frowned but nodded. “I know. I’m just… Shit, shit, fuck.” She turned sharply and started climbing up the ladder.

“Are you going to take the money from your parents?” Caleb asked, curiously as he moved to follow along.

“No, they’d notice.”

Jester and Caleb exchanged a glance but followed her up to the second level and then down the hall to her bedroom. She huffed as she flipped her mattress over and onto the floor. Strangely, the mattress jingled. “Beau?” Jester asked. “What are you doing?”

She started to dig through a hole in her mattress and tossed out bags of coins. “I’ve been saving this up for years. Whenever I could find loose coins around the house, or if I thought I could get away with sneaking a little bit away.” One bag clanged against the floor at Jester’s feet. Two, three, four. As Beau pulled out the final bag and tossed it to her she sighed and leaned back against the mattress with her legs stretched out in front of her. “Should be 4300 in there, I want my change back.”

Jester’s jaw dropped and she looked between Beau and and money. “Really? You want to spend your savings?”

The girl shrugged. “Whatever, I have tons left. It’ll be fine. Just take it down to town tonight, I don’t want it in this house in case someone finds it. Stay in a hotel, a nice one with a safe. Lock it in and pay the bail in the morning.”

Jester scooped up the bags and hid them under the fluffy dress. She nodded. “Right away. And Beau… I love you.”

Beau smiled at her and waved. “I love you too. Tell Molly to go fuck himself.”

Jester left the room and Caleb came over to help Beau right her mattress. “How much do you really have left?” he asked when she collapsed, exhausted, on the fussed mattress.

“Ten gold.”

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “That was for you and Jester, wasn’t it?”

“Well, it’s not like I had much choice. I can’t just leave them in there because my parents are pieces of shit. Besides, The Gentleman is going to set aside some of the profit from the winery. We won’t be penniless at least.”

Caleb nodded and looked between her and the open door. “About what we discussed?”

Beau dismissed him with a wave. “Yeah, yeah. I’m working on it. We can’t do shit while my dad’s in his office, I need to think of a way to distract him. This may all take more than a week if we want to do it right. So much for you getting out of my hair.”

He cleared his throat and started towards the door. “Thank you, Beauregard.”

“Fuck you. Get out.”

Caduceus woke up the following morning and stretched as the rising sun filtered in through his window. Birds chirped in the tree outside and he stopped to refill the feeder he kept there. “Hello, birds,” he said, smiling at them. He got dressed at his own pace. He was technically off today, but injuries wouldn’t wait until Monday and since he was going to be spending his day in the herb garden which was right out the exit door of the infirmary, he might as well be prepared for someone to wander in looking for assistance. He picked up his straw hat and his gardening tools and left his room, humming to himself as she walked the empty halls to the infirmary. There was already someone inside when he pushed open the door and he frowned sadly. “Beau? Are you okay?”

She turned to him and wiped at the blood that was leaking from her lip down her chin. Her eye was red and quickly swelling and her cheek was turning a nasty color of blue. She gave him a grin and then winced when the movement pulled at her injured lip. “Course I’m fine. Look at me, I’m the picture of health.”

He sighed and sat down his supplies to walk over to her. He took her face and gently turned it this way and that. “I take you’ve already seen your father this morning?”

She cleared her throat and finally looked away, but nodded. “Yeah. Trina left. Went to work for a new winery that just opened up in town. He called me into his office to work out his frustrations.”

He reached up and ran his glowing thumb over her lip until it healed completely. There was still a red stain leading from her injury and down her chin and neck. “This is getting worse, Beauregard. You asked me to let you handle it and I will, but at this rate he will kill you.”

He healed the cut on her eye and the swelling deflated back to normal. She reached up to pat his hand reassuringly. “I’ve got it handled, Deucie. I promise. I’m not dying in this goddamn house even if I have to crawl my way out in the end.” She reached up to give his shoulder a friendly squeeze and moved to leave.

“That’s not better, Beau. Just because you smirk when you say it doesn’t make it better.”

She shrugged and didn’t look back at him. “Makes it feel better. I’ll take what I can get. Thanks, Deuce, I’ll see you later.”

Beau left the infirmary and walked out the main door to see if she could meet Jester coming back from the prison. She walked out to the gates and started pacing along the boundary as she waited for her friend to appear. She heard the horses before she saw them rise up over a hill. She stepped out of the road and the carriage came to a stop in front of her. “Jes?” she called, giving the driver a quick wave. “Morning, Jim,” she said, reaching for the door and pulling open.

Jester scrambled out of the cabin and shut the door behind her before Beau could look inside and gave her friend a strained smile. “Beau! I wasn’t expecting you to meet me here.”

Beau frowned and tried to reach around her. “What are you hiding?”

“Nothing! Nothing, why would you think I was hiding anything?”

“Because you’re acting squirrely.”

“That’s not squirrely, this is squirrely.” She pulled back her lip to show off her buck teeth and started chittering like a rodent.

Beau chuckled. “Very cute, but seriously, Jes, what’s-”

She pulled open the door and a body fell out. Molly stumbled as he tried to catch himself and then posed like nothing had happened. “Hello, Beau! Good to see you again. How are you?”

Beau frowned and turned to Jester who was biting her lip and avoiding her eyes. “What is he doing here?”

“Yasha is here too,” Molly said, pointing in the carriage. A large pale hand just reached out of the door and gave a little wave before going back inside.

“Jester, what are they doing here? I thought you were going to free them and then send them on their way.”

“Well, see, since Gustav doesn’t have any bail we couldn’t get him out. And without Gustav there’s not really a circus. So Gustav closed the circus and Molly and Yasha didn’t have anywhere to go so…”

“So your friend kindly offered us jobs at your mansion here!” Molly said, grinning like he didn’t notice Beau’s distress.

Jester grabbed her arm when she saw Beau’s hand start to form a fist. “Listen, just listen, okay? Don’t be upset. Your parents don’t even know what they look like, they won’t realize who they are.”

Beau sighed heavily and scrubbed angrily at her face. “Fine! Fine. I’ll think of something. In the meantime, you two fuckers stay the hell out of sight. If my parents see you before I can think of an excuse for you to be here they will kill you. I’m not kidding.”

Molly bowed with a flourish. “Your wish is my command, Boss Lady.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“I knew it would bother you, Boss Lady, that’s why I said it.”

Beau frowned and waved at the carriage. “Just get in. Jim, back to the house please?”

They all squeezed into the carriage and Beau couldn’t even enjoy the fact that her thigh was pressed against Yasha’s because in her mind all she saw was all the ways this could go terribly wrong.