3. Chapter 3 The Gate #2
"You look nervous," she said.
"I'm not nervous."
"You look a little nervous. Liv, does he look nervous?"
Liv finished her stretch and sat down on the ground next to Sif's stone. She considered me with her head tilted and one ear forward. "He doesn't look nervous. He looks like a man who just got yanked through a portal for the first time and hasn't fully recovered."
"That's what I said."
"No, you said ‘nervous.’ There's a difference."
I put my hands on my knees. "I'm perfectly fine. Both of you can stop diagnosing me."
"Diagnosing," Sif said. She smiled slyly. "That's a medical word. Very on-brand for a Healer. And I'm not diagnosing you. I'm admiring you. There's also a difference."
"Is this what every dungeon morning is like? The two of you sitting here commenting on me?"
"Only on good mornings," Liv said. "Bad mornings we comment on Bjorna."
"Bjorna doesn't need commentary." Sif stretched her legs out and crossed her ankles. "Bjorna walks into a room and every pair of eyes looks at her and they make up their own minds."
I nodded. "That's true of most eight-foot women, I suppose."
"That's not what I meant and you know it." Sif's grin turned into something sharper, more direct. "You don't watch Bjorna because she's tall. You watch her because you can't stop."
"I watch all of you. You are all dangerous."
"Dangerous?" Sif said, intrigued.
"Yeah. Dangerous. In more ways than one."
Sif held my eyes for a second. The grin softened. Then she looked at Liv, and something passed between them that I wasn't sure I was supposed to see. Liv's ears went up and she bit her lower lip and looked away.
Liv tilted her head. "He's getting better at bantering with us."
"He's getting better at everything." Sif turned her dagger over in her hand. "It's very annoying."
"How is it annoying?" I asked.
"Because when you first showed up, you were this confused Outworlder who turned red when I flirted with you. That was fun. Now you flirt back and I have to actually try. It's exhausting."
"You don't look exhausted to me." I leaned back on my hands. "You look like you're having the time of your life. I can see what you are doing. The way you are sitting is strategic. You know I’m going to be looking at your bare stomach. You succeeded. I've already looked at it."
Sif pointed at me with one finger, her dagger still resting in her other hand. "See? That. He didn't used to do that."
"I've been a bad influence," Liv said. She bumped her shoulder against Sif's knee. "Or a good one. Depends on who you ask."
"If we're voting, I'm calling it a good one," I chimed in.
"Nobody asked you to vote." Sif pointed the dagger at me, then set it back across her thigh. "But your opinion is noted."
Liv stretched her arms above her head and yawned. "When they get back, Sif is going to pretend this whole conversation didn't happen."
"I don't pretend. I curate," Sif said.
"You curate." Liv looked at me. "She curates."
"Oh, I heard her.” I winked.
"I want to make sure you're paying attention," Liv said. "Because when Bjorna asks why you're smiling at the dungeon entrance, I want you to have the answer ready."
"I'll tell her Sif was being Sif."
"That'll do it," Sif said. She picked up her other dagger and started checking the edge with her thumb, her shoulders relaxed, her posture easy. She was done for now.
Bjorna and Nott came back from registration. Bjorna had the satisfied look she got when logistics were handled and nothing had gone wrong.
"We're slotted. Instance confirmed for five. Standard depth run, full clear. We’re ready."
She stood in the middle of the open ground with her shield on her back and her hands resting at her sides, and the morning light fell across the steel at her shoulders and the broad line of her arms. Her legs were braced apart, her weight settled, ready to move.
She looked like a woman who'd been doing this her entire life.
She looked like the reason the four of us could afford to sit around and joke.
"How long did they say?" Sif asked, standing and belting her daggers.
"They didn't give an estimate. The registrar said the reset was clean and the instance should be standard. We can go whenever we’re ready," Bjorna replied.
"I know I’m ready. The question is, is our human Outworlder ready?" Sif said teasingly.
Liv laughed. “For the love of the gods, Sif has been riding Daniel hard this morning.”
Sif’s eyes widened. “Liv, you dirty bunny. I’ve only done that in my mind.”
I blushed and shook my head.
“Sif, do I need to leave you outside while we go on our run?” Bjorna asked with a raised brow.
“Bjorna, if you actually want to succeed, you’ll want my help,” Sif shot back.
“There you go, busting Bjorna’s balls now,” Liv said.
Bjorna stabbed her mammoth sword into the ground. “I have no balls to bust.”
Liv cringed and held up both hands. “Sorry, sorry, bad choice of words.”
“Nott appears to be the only party member on her best behavior this morning,” I said.
“The morning is young,” Nott replied quietly, her eyes sparkling.
“Oh, damn, Nott has jokes. That isn’t normal at all. Daniel must have been a bad influence on their walk yesterday to buy portal scrolls,” Sif said.
“I was a perfect gentleman,” I objected. “I learned a lot about her magic and that’s it.”
“Oh, her ‘magic.’ Yes, that is what you call it,” Sif replied with a wink.
Bjorna gave everyone a look and the party gathered. Packs on, gear checked, the five of us moving toward the path that led to the dungeon entrance. Other parties were doing the same, a general drift of bodies and weapons toward the same direction.
A group came from the other direction.
Three men and two women, all human, geared in matching leather and steel that looked like it came from the same shop.
They were walking back from the entrance path.
The man in front was tall, broad at the shoulder, with a longsword at his hip and the posture of someone who'd never been told he was standing wrong.
He went straight to Bjorna and didn't stop looking.
"That's a big one," he said. Not to her. To the man beside him.
The second man laughed. "Bear-kin. You can smell ‘em before you see ‘em."
The tall one's gaze slid down the line, past Sif, past Nott and Liv, until it landed on me. His expression shifted, confusion first, then something harder.
"Is that a human Healer running with a beastkin party?"