The Wrap

As the sun shone through the window to her room, Octavia was awoken from her slumber. The fatigue from the taxing night before had been washed away by the good night's sleep, leaving her open to enjoy the new day. She opened her eyes, seeing the stone ceiling of her room in the castle and thought ahead on what the day could bring.

Having completed her shopping trip and her visit to the garden, all that remained was a journey to the library to uncover any secrets of the Lamia. Once done, she would be free to wander into the outside world and continue her pilgrimage, by searching for another Lamia village and continuing the trials.

It would be some time before this could happen though, as while she wanted to learn more about her race, enduring the trials brought many risks. While the ones she had already completed did have safety nets, that didn't mean it was certain she would always be fine.

Something else to add to the to-do list was to actually learn how to fight and survive. While she managed to deal with the totem and took on the bandits with relative ease, neither held a candle to the assailants from last night. She fought with all her might but was only able to deal any damage due to the surprise of attacking with her tail. It was also only sheer luck that the noise woke Sylvia at the time she did, in order to ring the bell and save her life. Any later, it was likely both of them would have been killed or kidnapped. This was something Octavia took to heart as she realised the shortcomings she had.

She had the strength that her new form gave her. She also had abilities like her paralytic bite and a natural weapon in her tail. But this proved useless against someone with actual skill. The man's speed prevented her from making any real counterattack to his blows, of which he landed a few times. If she was still human, it was likely that the first few would have taken her out of the picture quickly. All of which was something that needed to be rectified.

While they would prepare to travel to Sylvia's mom's grave and Octavia for her pilgrimage, she would talk to Lord Desmon about the possibility of receiving training and hopefully learn something that could save her life in the journeys to come.

But before all of that, she would have to leave the confines of her bed and start the day. To do that, she would first have to unwrap herself from the bedding she for some reason had wrapped her tail around.

Still rubbing sleep out her eyes, she slowly unwrapped her tail from the bedding, sliding her tail along it as she did. The strange thing was that this elicited some moans nearby.

"Where is that coming from?" Octavia wondered, but as she looked over to her side, things started to make sense, "Oh yeah, I slept next to Sylvia."

How she had forgotten this, she did not know, but this still didn't solve the mystery of why she was moaning.

"Maybe she's having a nice dream", was a possibility that came to Octavia's mind, and so she continued with the unwrapping of her tail…

"Ummm"

… but had to stop once the moans started again.

As she looked over at Sylvia again, she was finally able to see what was actually happening.

It wasn't bedding that she had wrapped around, but it was Sylvia herself.

From her dainty feet, Octavia's tail wrapped around her legs a couple of times, finishing with a tight grip around her waist. So far, she had managed to remove the grasp she had around Sylvia's feet, but the rest of her bottom half still remained.

But as Octavia put two and two together, she realised that the sliding of her tail against Sylvia was what was causing her to moan, and not a nice dream that she may be having.

"There is always the possibility that this is causing her to have a nice dream though." She laughed to herself, but this was quickly replaced by embarrassment. Whether it was due to the situation of the stupid comment, she didn't know, but it was probably both.

How was she going to get out of this? She had to unwrap her tail in order to leave the bed, and the only way to do that was to actually unwrap it. There wasn't anything else she could do, aside from chopping Sylvia's legs or her own tail off, but obviously, that couldn't happen.

It took some time to mull this over, but she decided she would just have to do it and endure. The unwrapping of her tail, not the chopping part.

As she slowly unwrapped herself, endure she did. She kept repeating in her head for Sylvia to not wake up, over and over again. While a good thing to wish for, she only repeated this in order to block out the moans and other sounds coming from Sylvia as she slowly untangled herself.

It only took several seconds to fully remove her tail, but they felt like hours, and once done, Octavia laid back down on the bed exhausted.

"It's like there was no point in going to sleep at all." It was the case that the exhaustion from yesterday had practically returned. But not as bad as then thankfully.

…

It didn't take too long and Sylvia woke from her sleep.

"Good morning."

"G-Good morning" Octavia replied.

"That was such a good night's sleep, the best I've had in a while. We should probably sleep next to each other more often." Sylvia giggled as she made her way into her room, likely to get changed.

"Y-yeah. Sleeping next to each other. Again. Sounds great. Very relaxing. Not at all embarrassing."

Octavia mumbled the last few parts of that reply.

…

Working up the effort to make her way out the bed, Octavia did her morning routine and before she knew it, she was eating breakfast with Lord Desmon and his family.

As they sat there, Elliot fussed over Sylvia, asking whether she was fine and that maybe she should stay in the room near him so that he could protect her.

Sylvia could only laugh in good nature at how nice he was, trying to be brave and protect his friend. She told him that she would be staying with Octavia and that he didn't have to worry, but this very quickly resulted in a glare from the young boy aimed at Octavia whenever Sylvia was not looking

Pushing that aside, after answering even more questions and concerns from Bethany, they finally got onto other topics.

"Ah, Octavia. I have managed to get you access to the library. It is open most of the day, closing in the evening. You shall need this document for you to enter, so be sure to look after it." Lord Desmon said as he passed the access papers to Sylvia, who passed them onto her.

"Thank you, Lord Desmon."

A few other topics were brought up, more studying for the children, and more paperwork for the adults, of which none of the family was happy about. But this was quickly forgotten as a few interesting items were spoken about.

"So, we have begun the manhunt for the Hidden Collectors. It may take some time, but we should be able to deal a large blow against this group eventually. We have a lot of men tasked with finding the group, but they are very clever, so it may take some time before we make any real headway. I would think that being under threat would mean they would cease high-profile activities for a while, trying to capture you being one of them, but this is not certain. If you do go out, please allow a handful of guards to travel with you as they have before, just to be safe."

"I… yes of course."

There wasn't really anything she could say against that. Aside from the reduction in some freedom, having a retinue of guards to protect her, for the time being anyway, was the safest thing to do.

…

"Oh yes, I hope none of you have forgotten about the grand ball that is taking place in our halls in a few days. Apologies Octavia for not mentioning it sooner, but this has been in the works for several weeks now, and with all that has happened so far, I forgot to mention it. In case you do not know, the grand ball is held twice a year within the kingdom, and it is held by a different lord each time, where this year we shall be holding one. Lords and Ladies from all over the kingdom shall journey to our town in order to meet with each other, talk, dance and feast."

"That sounds lovely. I'm sure it will be amazing."

Lord Desmon quickly looked over at his wife who nodded to him.

"Would you like to go?" he said as he turned back to her.

*snort*

Octavia almost choked on her drink as she heard that question.

"I…I. *cough* How would I be able to go? I am not a noble."

"That does not matter. The Lord hosting the ball is given some leeway in who may attend. For some lords, they need to invite commoners for all sorts of roles in the ball, entertainment, cooks, servants, the list goes on. I don't see why you couldn't be invited to join as my honoured guest."

All Octavia could think about was all of the novels she had read where many horrible situations occurred at events like this. Other lords and ladies looking down on the commoner, and the protagonist making some sort of mistake leading to a lord taking revenge on them. She could not recall one where something good happened at something like this, aside from the obvious romantic books that is.

"I'm sure Sylvia would love for you to come and may also be able to learn about Lamia's from the other nobles."

"I would love to come."

…

She stayed quiet for a while after that, given how easily she was lured in.

…

As breakfast drew to a close, everyone started to head out to their next engagement. Before Lord Desmon left, Octavia decided to bring up training.

"I don't see why not. While your weapon is unusual, as many of the guards and knights have swords and spears, I am sure there is someone who can teach you how to fight with it. If not for your weapon specifically, I am sure they can help you with the basics. Speak to Knight Commander Jeremiah in the courtyard after lunch, I shall let him know you shall be coming."

"Thank you, Lord Desmon."

Once Lord Desmon left, Sylvia said she would be going to write letters to inform her family members of her mother's death. Octavia checked to make sure she would be ok, of which she said she would be fine and would join her at lunch.

With that, everyone left and Octavia was able to do as she pleased

She would soon learn how to actually fight and better survive in this world.

But first, the library beckoned.