Chapter 2: Hallway

While the eldest daughter was getting interrogated, the youngest stepdaughter slowly crept down to basement prison. Truly a sparce place the dungeon was, in fact the only furnishing within each cell was a grated drain hole with a large opening for…best not think of that. Mary had never been to the basement and was sure no one would approve, but in absent of word from the duke, the guards paid no mind.

As far as filthy cesspools went, this was four-star accommodations. As part of the daily torment routine all prisoners were hosed down, food was uncooked, raw but satisfied basic requirements for human fare and if one behaved a cushion and bed roll would be allowed. Past the light side of the stone prison, down the hall and a few flights of stairs was an actual cesspool. Heinous criminals were bathed there weekly.

Torture and general acts against humanity also occurred on the dark side of the prison. Wordlessly she sat down on the floor where the staff placed the best pillows available.

"Lady Iris? It never ceased to amaze just how stunning the women looked. Even imprisoned, luminescent skin, captivating eyes, and the silkiest hair.

"Mary?" Iris was shaken out of her repose. "It's been forever, how are you?"

"How am I? You are in jail!" She was bit surprised at how lightly the maid was taking things. However, Iris had always acted as she pleased.

"Minor details. This is a curtesy for duchy, but if they attempt to hurt me, I am bringing this whole place down."

"As expected of Miss Iris, this is all part of her master plan!" Mary exclaimed as she sparked. Iris wasn't the most tactful or deceitful of fighters, who twisted and turned and controlled every move. She tended to just hit things…and kept hitting…a lot. Embarrassed she couldn't say she was so distracted that she was hauled off like the catch of the day.

"So how did you get yourself caught so you can infiltrate the duchy?" She asked still radiating stardust.

"Well, it went something like this- "Iris began after a moment's hesitation.

Valentine had come running, her red curls bouncing. Her dress was a set of bows elegantly placed along the skirt, and a soft bodice. Iris was in her Daoist robes, with layers of silk, her strait black hair shimmering.

"Good Morn-!" Whatever Iris had planned to say was cut off when the duchess attacked.

A tongue had found its way into her mouth, and Iris Xin can say with absolute certainty that it is the first time this had ever occurred. Hands and arms tightened on the small of my back., and unfathomable heat boiled across the sage.

It was a new experience and misgivings aside, Iris secretly enjoyed every minute of it. When had the duchess become so bold, like a stalking hunter? Not once in the long, pleasant time we had spent together had the girl been found to be aggressive. So many saw the great master as river rock, when a meek quiet and calm girl outside of her study didn't see the sage in that manner, it was heaven sent.

Her leg pressed against the sages' thighs as the duchess sought to drive her soft body as close as she could. The longer the noble lady furiously attacked, the harder it was to remain standing. Iris slid down the wall, the rough surface pulling at silken cloths. Undaunted, Valentine simply slid with me. Panting heavily, she once more pressed her soft lips to Iris's, driving out all thoughts but the soft sensual duchess.

Noble Duchess Valentine was on top of Iris in a deserted hallway, at some point the hall stopped being deserted. Shortly after the taller women was pried off the sage. Promptly picked up by several burly guard types, Xin found herself unceremoniously tossed into the barren but roomie dungeons in the depth of the duchy's manor.

Someone was romantically interested in Iris, as a person not one of the ten great masters. What a gigantic thought. If it wasn't in the direct path of cultivation, it was tossed aside. Surviving the harsh wrath of heavens tribulations paled in comparison to what pair had just done. It had been months since they had last seen each other, even the "confession" at the ball could have been sisterly.

Valentine's hands clutching the spine of the shorter had been desperate, and yet held a hint of softness. Her lacy and bow laden dress did nothing to stop her womanly curves from prodding into the cultivators. Incredibly buttery legs rubbed against silks that did nothing to stop tactility.

No wonder every guy talked about and wanted to have a girl's lips! Delectable softness and a hint of roughness with a divine heavenly scent of a girl hot and bothered? Iris had no idea that she had missed so much out in her several hundred years of life.

Spinning left and right the newly minted immortal blushed fiercely as she couldn't contain her embarrassment. Slamming her fist into the cold slate floor, chips fist imprints and spidery cracks appeared before the nervousness faded.

"You showed up shortly after." Iris stated finishing her recount of the events that had led her to her imprisonment.

Mary Elis Lockheed had not been aware of the events that occurred at last night's ball. When her sister had vanished, her father's arms men had quickly escorted her home. With her elder sister being interrogated by her father and mother this morning, she had no choice but to go to the only other source of last night's events.

Iris Xin had been a mysteries figure in her life, arriving before the girl had learned of her birth father's identity. Now Lady Mary was open mouthed half smiling as the prisoner recounted a hot steamy make out session in the middle of the hallway.

"Wow I didn't know that big sister had it in her." Mary finally spoke her face-stained red.

Embarrassment caught up and the confined prisoner opened new cracks in the floor as she banged her head against the ground. Mary had noticed the strange indentions but had not realized that it had been the girl who had caused it.

"How can you do that?"

"Do what?" Iris lifted her head from face shaped imprint she left in the floor.

"Your putting holes in stone, with your face."

"That's nothing," Waving off the girl, this kind of physical ability is expected of a cultivator of her skill.

"Can I learn? How did you learn?"

"It's a long story, and it won't make sense if you don't hear the whole thing." Siting up, Iris faced the blond-haired blue-eyed girl." Plus, it's kind of embarrassing to tell you so much of my dark history."

"More embarrassing than making out with my sister in the hallway?"

"…point taken, to start with I lost my parents young, disease. I picked up by an herbalist who had gotten some of the basic mixed elemental foundation manuals, the common ones that were everywhere. When I turned fourteen, I went to sect testing, but it wasn't until sometime a year or so later that I managed to become an outer disciple of one of the beggar sects, my foundation was built to wide it turns out. That's gist of where I started, but let me tell you about where I lived…"

!@# !@# !@#

"Fire Blast! Ice spear! Wind Squall" A young Iris Xin, with chubby checks and short stature, was a vast distance from the exotic women she grew into. She lived alone in a small shack on the far outskirts, up several hills, and perched near a small cliff edge into the forest wilds. Beyond what was needed to survive, Iris practiced the same set of basic abilities. From the outside, it looked like a young child playing about. Inside views from Iris's thoughts, flames shot from her fingertips, ice rained from the heavens, the very wind did as she bade. Nevertheless, it counted as cultivation, with each exaggerated motion the girl slowly gathered energy within meridians.

No evidence existed that any specific time would aid in the building of one's foundation, but as a young child she believed it had to be done on the full moon.

With little else to do before she refined her foundation .she sat, lotus style, on her small rock and waited for the moon to climb into the sky. When it seemed sufficient, she began to build a foundation in the depths of her soul.

"When you began to build your foundation, you must first find the dead center of your meridian, the pathways in which qi flows through the body. You must than connect each node to that center. Every one of them, each connection is the bricks of your foundation."

The voice of her instructor echoed in her mind.

"While you do this picture how you want such a foundation to look. Don't make it to small or you won't be able to withstand the weight of your strength later."

Each brick was meticulously placed and stout brick proving grounds was constructed in the very depths of her soul.

"Something like that." After attending the short foundation lecture, she had returned to her ransacked Hut, which led to the formation of her foundation as the moon touched the proving grounds. This turned out to be a delusion as the future sage had completely failed to form a foundation and was scoffed at by members of the Silver Sword Sect.

Refusing to let the small maters like talent and intellect get in her way, driven by an active imagination she wondered slowly north. The Five Great Sects in an effort to improve the quality of those joining the sect had made basic cultivation and foundation available in major towns and cities.

Smaller sects that belonged to the great sect alliance were often responsible for teaching these to the masses. Quality and content varied wildly. At 16 Iris had built her foundation, comprised of an unwieldly and wild base built from the various instructions, as she traveled north to the Ku Lee mountains. Two of the Five greats, Mt Hua, and Pinnacle Sword Cloud existed there.

Like the five great sects this marked her fifth great failure to join a sect. Having grown weary the girl rested in the wilds, becoming as wild as it was remote.

Common beast found humans strange, and thus avoided them in general. Any beast that lived 10 years, took its first step in cultivation. These were not generally different than any other animal but would accumulate intelligence, qi and Dao. This included accumulation from all prey, humans as well.

"Why didn't my skills work?!" Iris wailed. In pursuit of young Iris was a diamondback porcupine. Four feet of bristling diamond tip quills and an aggressive attitude. Despite what she imagined she could not launch fire or ice at anyone, much less the soft rounded face of the adorably large porcupine. Tears flew from her eyes as she tore down the woods.

"I'm going to die! I'm going to die!" She shouted. "Don't eat me!"

"Now!"

From above a tall male figure cried and out of seemingly nowhere a large burlap sprang up, wrapping the enraged animal. Several others in disciple robes descend from various perches, throwing thin strips of paper talismans to calm the beast.

"What's a paper talisman?" Mary interrupted the narrative.

"Wards?" Seeing the blank look on her guest, she pulled a few out of her rings. "Here you can have these. Be careful with the last one, its called 'The Crisper'. If the survive the lightning they will not be happy"

Looking at the colorful papers and strange lines on them, she wasn't sure what to make of them.

"Take this one and focus on it, think of it as letting your heat flow about it." Surprised shock filled the sister, as the talisman in her hand glowed softly before it exploded into a small shower of sparks. Cool blue and green stars floated about for a moment before fading.

"What was that? It was so pretty! Mary said rapidly as her initial shock faded.

"Sparkler talisman, spirt energy can be used in place of raw qi to activate the stored pattern there. It was skill that i wasn't good at, so this elder could never make them but I used many over the years." Thinking a moment, she continued.

"Don't worry about it and just keep them on hand, it should be fine." Waving off any more concerns.

"It was my first encounter with the Quill Sect, who I ended up joining. Strangely enough the porcupine didn't want to eat me, it was mating season.

"Why was that strange?" Lady Mary asked with a tilted head. "Did that mean that the porcupine found you attractive?"

"I'm not sure, it was a girl…now that I think about it, I had a lot of girls following me around for some reason." Iris distractedly scratched her head.

"That aside let me tell you about the some of my times in the Quill sect…"

!@# !@# !@#

While Lady Iris was informing Lady Mary of some of her time and adventures within the beast clan sect, Duchess heir Valentine was dealing with both stepmother and father,

"Wait, if that's the ball than when did you learn to fly a sword?" Charlotte asked idly waving a feather fan about.

"I learned it when I was working within the Claw Rook Marital Cult. Its something you must learn to ascend to nascent realm."

"Nas-spent?" Valentine had wondered for the longest time why her father had fallen for such a spacy woman.

"Nascent, it was what I needed to return." Quietly the duke observed his daughter. Strange events had occurred that he truly didn't understand. Events had forced him to accept it, but there were many things he would not stand for. His daughter outside of his control, the spiteful Iris Xin who he would one day hold vengeance over, the strange power that they both seemed to possess.

"I was worried when you disappeared, but both Mary and Even insisted you would be fine, so I didn't worry anymore." Vapid smile, it was strangely hard to hate this woman. It must have been the complete lack of guile and deceit so common among the nobility. Iris was similar, but had a cute petty side that Valentine found adorable.

"Roughly speaking you disappeared mid-fall and reappeared a year and a half later. Yet you speak as if you were gone far longer." Duke Lockheed called from behind his desk.

"Iris appeared mid fall as well, and I left midsummer the next year. She followed me at the very start of spring, and I returned late fall, her two weeks after." Valentine stated as she corrected and outlined the times of their crossovers. "It took me four years to reach golden orb stage, and I was considered fast for such progress. Iris guided me for two years on just breaking through the nascent stage. Fifteen, it took fifteen years to go from foundation building to Nascent soul. I was incredibly lucky, and it was only possible thanks to the overwhelming pure Qi that exist here."

"Impossible, if you wish to lie you should at least come up with something believable." Her father scoffed.

"Wow we're almost the same age than!"

Valentine hmphed and said nothing more.

"You must have been tainted by that commoner scu-"What was this? Why couldn't I speak? Heavy as if buried, why? Valentine didn't say anything but simply exerted her spiritual pressure. The glare that she leveled her father with peeled the finish of his desk, satisfied that the message of not insulting Iris was clear, she released her father. Clearing his throat and adjusting his vest and collar, he chose a different question.

"If we consider the start from this bandit incident, when did you first notice that the commoner was…special?" It was barely tolerable but allowed to pass since there wasn't yet a particular reason to end her father.

"Honestly, she was strange from the start, in fact she didn't know what a duchy was. In retrospect its obvious now why that was. Head maid had no problem with her work, nor did she so difficulty learning from others. Despite her weird behaviors she worked hard and was easily accepted. My first indication that she special came from the first outing we took."