[b]Alina![/b]

One strong and gentle hand runs down the back of your head. She’s so careful with you. That’s why you trust your Queen.

“I might just happen to have a beggar’s key here,” Rhyza says, and a small copper pin tumbles out of her sleeve: a lockpick, a scoundrel’s friend. “So what you will do, little [i]princess,[/i]” she purrs, like a tiger sitting neatly before you, idly flexing her claws, “is make anyone passing by believe that I am doing my job of getting you ready for interrogation. Forget the guards at the flap: I need the cooks on the other end of camp to hear you holler as I punish you with feather and whip.”

She reaches up and starts working on the fiendishly clever locks, leaning forward so that her tunic parts ever so slightly at eye level to help inspire you. She’s asking you to toss all of your dignity out the window, so that she isn’t caught and chained up next to you. How much is your dignity worth, Alina?

***

[b]Adila![/b]

Ten, eleven, twelve.

Thirteen.

That is the lesson of the Dragon’s Clock, its method and its means. It was made for you by devils, perhaps not you in the specific, but for the dragon who would be standing here right now. Time and dragons and old stories, clocks and time woven from the hungry void at the beginning of everything, with this moment and this place as its anchoring point.

What came next? What did you do in the moments just beyond this one, this slivering, this fire-on-the-heart?

***

[b]Kazelia![/b]

The smoke bomb wakes you up, but you were ready when you saw that bright, startlingly vivid light suddenly upon you. Your heart knew what was happening before your head caught up.

There’s a fight going on in the room now, only perceptible through eddies of smoke and the startled squeaks from Rita as she tries to defend her territory and her captive from your invading ninja girlfriend. Kyouko is fast, well-armed, and has the element of surprise on her side— but if Rita manages to find her footing after the initial assault, she’s got a decent chance of turning the tables—

And there’s you, too. Traditionally, you’re “out” when you’re captured, not allowed to get involved in fights until you’re rescued, but have you learned that yet? And if you have, are you willing to use your magic to help one of the fighters in the smoke-choked hotel room?

Whether this coin lands (fuzzy) heads or (kitten) tails, whether it’s nudged one way or the other by your interference and magic, it’ll be settled by the time the smoke clears, and [i]someone’s[/i] ending up back to back with you.