[h3]Artemisia de Chauret[/h3]

So, her name was Serafaye. A strange name, to be sure, but the girl was spouting some even stranger nonsense. What was a Severanoxis, and where was the Herculon Gorge? Artemisia knew her geography very well, and not just for the local cluster of countries, either. She had never heard of that place before. 

It was rather more likely that this girl was seriously delusional or mistaking some discount romance novel for reality. She didn’t really believe any of the nonsense about another plane or reality that Cecilia suggested, either.

It was even more strange when Artemisia’s companions and Serafaye started touching each other. 

Artemisia didn’t actually have a problem with a bit of skinship. It was not like she wasn’t innocent of it herself in the school baths in better times…

But there was a time and place, and Locke was the first to point it out, and Artemisia was all too kind to add on to that.
“Unless you have some amazing power up those ridiculous looking sleeves of yours, then we should be leaving.”

Shifting her gaze from Serafaye back to Cecelia, the merchant girl frowned. “I [i]could[/i], if either party acquiesces. The way I see it, neither she nor I would find that arrangement agreeable.”

She shrugged, before quickly following up, the sounds of suspiciously uniform footsteps approaching in the distance. “My intuition says to break east.  There seems to be less resistance coming from that side.”

With that, she remounted her horse, ready to get a very quick move on, but not before giving a long stare at the star girl.

“And yes, you are a girl.”