Chapter 79. Dante's Fellowship Lost.

"I'm afraid you're going to have to repeat a year, Miss Skolder," the headmistress said unsympathetically. "You've missed entirely too much class time. Despite your father's prestige, this simply can't be overlooked."

"Are you perhaps…joking?" Everly asked the older woman. "Can't you just wave a hand and send me merrily on my way?"

"Not a chance," the headmistress replied. "And frankly, I find your attitude disappointing. This academy isn't just a place of learning, Miss Skolder. It's a sacred place of bonding where even people with substandard talent such as yourself can improve your relationship with your elemental and thus improve your grasp of magic. A certain expectation of proficiency is expected of you by society. And by the gods, we will instill it within you!"

The headmistress's office was a very austere place. Some would say severe. While it lacked in color and personality, it had straight lines and dust-free shelves aplenty. There were also paintings and a few scrolls hanging around, but they told the viewer nothing about the person who inhabited this office. It didn't even offer any free hints.

In her previous life, Everly had made it a point to keep her grades high to avoid situations exactly like this. When you did poorly in school, teachers began asking you questions. When you continued to do poorly in school, then they began asking your parents questions. Although Marcis was now firmly under her thumb, Everly didn't want the academy to contact Lyona.

The poor woman was already having enough difficulties as it was.

"Listen," Everly said bluntly. "Is there any way we can just wave this away? Start over? Bury things under the rug? If the academy needs a new donation, I'm certain my father would be willing to write however large a cheque you require. He's got all the money in the world, but he only has one daughter."

"You have an older sister, Everly. Her name is Claudia," the headmistress said with a frown.

"Holy shit, I completely forgot she existed," Everly said.

"Language like that will certainly not endear you to me, girl," the headmistress said with a cluck of her tongue. "And while I thank you for your generous offer of your father's money, the academy is well funded by the royal coffers. We do not need your desperate bribes. We only require your presence in class."

"Well, shoot. It sounds like you've got all the answers, lady," Everly scowled. "But hey, hypothetically speaking, what if I was bonded to a godlike spirit elemental who could allow me to manipulate your mind like putty? With that being the case, what if I told you to let me pass anyway and you were completely helpless to stop me?"

"Then I suppose I'd have to let you pass, wouldn't I?" the headmistress replied with a scowl of her own. But it's fortunate for us both that such a scenario is unlikely to occur, isn't it, Miss Skolder?"

"Let me pass," Everly commanded her.

"It shall be done, my Empress," the headmistress said at once.

"Adjust my grades so that they're among the highest in my class. Punish any teacher who dares to ask why. Also, make Fridays into pizza days."

"I don't know what a pizza is," the headmistress confessed.

"THEN LEARN!" Everly bellowed.

"Who will teach me?" the headmistress asked.

"Oh, right," Everly said. "Never mind about pizza on Fridays."

"Yes, my Empress!" the headmistress said fanatically.

__

"Well, I hope you're happy, dumbass," Everly said to Nev as she sat down to lunch with her and Beverly at an outdoor patio. "You nearly had me repeating a grade thanks to all the school you missed."

"Organized crime doesn't run itself, Everly," Nev said as she dipped a cracker into the communal bowl of spicey cheese sauce that they all shared. "If I'm not there to keep business handled, all sorts of problems could arise. Honestly, that academy was lucky to have me on the days I felt like showing up."

"So, I guess we're just abandoning the plan, then?" Everly asked her as she dipped a cracker of her own. "No one's going to do what I want, everyone's just going their separate ways?"

"Well, it would be nice," Nev said hopefully.

"It's bullshit!" Everly grunted. "I created you guys to make my life more convenient, not to start doing things for yourself. You seriously want to go your own way?"

"Well, Everly, people do grow up eventually," Bev said. "Don't get me wrong, I think you're awesome, and I love you a ton, but the more time I spend in the world, the more I start to think I'm not like you at all."

"We have the same mind, we share the same thoughts," Everly insisted.

"Yeah, that's true, but we don't focus on the same things," Nev cut in. "Everly, face it. You're never going to let us be your equals."

"Of course, I won't," Everly said. "Nobody is my equal."

"And that's cool and all. I totally love that about you," Nev said.

"As do I," seconded Bev.

"But we share your same spiteful personality traits. Frankly, I'd rather rule in Hell if I can't in heaven," Nev told her.

"Yep," Bev said. "Dantes Inferno all the way, yo."

"It's Paradise Lost, you super-blonde," Nev said through clenched teeth.

"I knew that! I was just testing you," said Bev. "And you failed, by the way. You failed the friendliness test."

"Do you guys really want to leave me?" Everly asked with genuine surprise. "Is the fellowship truly broken?"

"Is that more Dante?" asked Beverly.

"Everly, you cannot possibly believe that I'm willing to keep putting up with that," Nev said while pointing an angry finger at her sister.

"Yeah, I suppose not," Everly said sadly. "Strangely, a sense of melancholy has taken hold of me. I kind of hate you both, but I also love myself so much. It's hard to let go of you."

"I feel the same way, you tyrannical bitch," Nev said as she came in close for a hug. "But it's not like I'm gone from your life. We technically still live in the same town. Stop by the docks anytime you want to consult or hang out."

"Do you really intend to create some sort of magical drug cartel in this country?" Everly asked her after they broke from their embrace.

"Yep," Nev said. "I'm still evil, after all! Scarface forever! It's not enough just to make money. I have to do my best to strike fear in the public while I'm at it."

"Damn, you're a trooper," Everly said with genuine admiration. "No regrets about Tyler?"

"Nah, I had Titania 3-D print me a new Tyler after King Shadow decapitated the earlier model. This one's a lot more useful and a lot more durable."

"Well, look at you go, Bonney and Clyde," Everly said with a smirk. "You'll be the terror of the capital before you know it."

"It's what I do," Neverly said as she gathered her things. "See you from the shadows, bitches," she said in farewell.

Then without a backward glance, she walked away.

"Shoot, she was really cool," Bev said after Nev departed. "You better watch out for her, Everly, she's really sharp."

"It's fine. I still have the kill switch installed," Everly shrugged.

"You installed kill switches in us?!" Beverly asked in alarm.

"No, just her," Everly said reassuringly. "I know you wouldn't hurt a fly."

"Aww, thanks, Everly!"

"Flies think too quickly for you to handle."

"Everly, that's mean!" Bev said in a wounded voice.

"I do my best," Everly agreed. "So, what are you going to do now that you can't be Lance anymore?"

"I dunno," Beverly said thoughtfully. "Maybe I'll take up a hobby. Being a hero was so much work. I think this time I wanna get into baking. Baking looks like fun."

"How's that going to sustain you on your journey, though?" Everly wondered. "I mean, I've never heard of a wandering baker before."

"Journey? Wandering? What the hell are you talking about?" Beverly asked her. "Make some sense, Everly!"

"Uh, how about you first? You're leaving the circle, right? So, how are you going to take care of yourself?" Everly asked her.

"Oh, no, Everly, you got it all wrong," Bev told her quickly. "No, I just don't want to work for you anymore. Working for you sucks, you're so demanding! But yeah, just because I quit being your minion doesn't mean I'm going anywhere. The memory palace has everything I'll ever need. Why would I leave?"

Everly stared at her duplicate in slack-jawed amazement.

"Bev, are you fucking serious?" she eventually asked her.

"Serious as a heart attack," Bev affirmed.

"You slacker," Everly said with gradually rising contempt. "You shiftless, lazy, shut-in. Are you really going to spend the life I gave you watching television and sleeping?"

"It's going to be aces ahoy," Bev said happily. "I'm already looking forward to it!"

"Bev, I'm fucking serious: Get a part-time job," Everly ordered her. "Something that keeps you out of the palace for at least ten hours a week."

"Why? I don't need money," Bev said in confusion.

"Yeah, well you're not just going to mooch off me either!" Everly yelled at her. "I said I'm serious! If you're not going to help me conquer the world, then you're getting a goddamn job."

"But what can I do?" Bev whined. "I don't have any marketable skills!"

"Marketable skills?!" Everly asked with a kind of deranged wonder. "Bev, you stupid idiot, you utter dum-dum, you bent elbow, you're a superhuman killing machine! Just sign back up with the adventurer's guild and take quests."

"But I just got out of that!" Beverly wailed.

"Did you? Well, I'm sure they missed you," Everly said unpityingly.

"Everly!" whined Bev.

"I don't want to hear it!"

"EVERLY!" Bev bawled even louder.

"WELCOME TO THE REAL WORLD, NEET!" Everly thundered at her.

After things were settled with her surviving duplicates, Everly paid a visit to the village of Anders, where her mother had recently returned.

Things hadn't been quite the same between Everly and her mother, not since Lyona had learned the truth about her daughter. Marcis had convinced her not to erase her mind again, and instead let her bear the knowledge.

"I don't like it," Everly complained to him. "She's always mad at me. She's always blaming me for the things I do."

"But she also sees you, Everly," her father had said. "She sees you without a veil. Now you'll never have to hide your true nature from her. That sort of honesty can be good for a relationship. It facilitates bonding."

"It sounds more like cold-hearted manipulation," Everly opined.

"Well, whatever gets the job done," Marcis smirked.

"Have you told Claudia about Anne, yet?" Everly asked him.

"Why do I have to? You're the one who killed her," Marcis whined.

"Oh my god, Dad, she was your wife for twenty years," Everly said with genuine disgust.

"Yes, and nineteen years and eleven months of those years were awful," Marcis said with a shudder. "Never again shall I remarry. In honor of dear Anne's memory, I shall remain a bachelor forevermore."

Everly nodded and said nothing. Then a thought came upon her.

"Uh, Dad?" she asked him.

"Yes, my angel?" he replied.

"Don't you have another legal wife? Caleb and Claudia's mother?" Everly asked.

"Cammy?" Marcis asked in total shock. "Uh, Everly?"

"Yes, Dad?"

"Would you be disappointed in your father if he confessed that he forgot about his second wife entirely?"

"Immensely," answered Everly. "It'd be beyond the pale. I would have no words."

"Ah. Then I shall endeavor never to mention her again," Marcis said with a sage nod.

"Dad?" asked Everly.

"Yes, Angel?"

"Where's Caleb at?"

"Your other brother?" Marcis said. "I confess, I have no idea. Anne's sister recruited him for something."

"Anne's dead," Everly said. "I left a body behind. They're probably going to be upset about that."

"I have no doubt. Feel free to kill them too if they raise a fuss over it."

"Caleb included?" she wondered.

"My children can sort out their issues amongst themselves without any direction from me," Marcis said indifferently.

"Ah," Everly nodded. Then a few moments later, she asked, "Dad, we really are bad people, aren't we?"

"Oh, Everly," Marcis said before giving her a fond kiss on the forehead and tousling her hair. "You and I are absolute garbage."

Then he tossed an arm around her shoulder and together they watched the sun rise.

__

"So, what are you going to do with me now?" Discordia asked Everly. "I didn't assist Lance with his rebellion, but I didn't warn you either. That still makes me a traitor, doesn't it?"

"It sure does," Everly agreed. "Normally, I'd just kill you for what you did. But we're still bonded, so I'd be doing damage to myself. It's a real conundrum for me, Dis."

"Please don't call me that," Discordia pleaded.

"Why, does it annoy you?" Everly asked her.

Discordia refused to answer.

"Why aren't you answering?" asked Everly.

"I feel that no matter how I respond to your question, you'll still twist my answer in such a way that ends with you calling me Dis," she said wearily.

"Haha, how right you are," Everly chuckled. "But all the same, Dis, what do you feel your punishment should be? Be honest, now."

"Everly, I have nothing and no one. Nothing you can take from me will ever replace what I've already lost," Discordia said sadly. "Can we please skip the sadistic preamble? Just kill me already."

"My goodness," Everly said. "You know, you're the second person to request a mercy kill from me this week."

"Did you grant the first person's request?" asked Discordia.

"I did," Everly nodded.

"Will you grant mine?" Discordia asked hopefully.

"Nah," Everly said. "I have a better punishment in mind."

Taking the elemental by her hand, Everly led her back to her bedroom, where Fenn continued to lay on the floor and stare blankly at the ceiling in despair.

"I'm not a loser," she mumbled to herself.

"Nah, definitely not," Everly said to her. "This is totally a normal thing that winners often do a week after getting kicked out of paradise. They lay around and keep bitching about it."

"Screw you, blondie, you don't know anything about anything," said Fenn in one long, disinterested sentence.

"Oh, good god, can you do anything with this?" Everly asked Discordia impatiently.

"You know, Everly, you were depressed for quite some time after originally murdering Fenn," said Discordia sharply. "Maybe you could try showing some empathy for how she's feeling right now since you know exactly what she's going through."

"Yeah, maybe, sure, perhaps, no," Everly replied. "Too much work, you do it."

"I could perhaps have soothed her from within at one time, but now my beloved lady is deceased, and I am now bonded to you," Discordia informed her. "There's nothing to be done."

"BRING ME SOME PROTIEN," Everly yelled.

A gateway appeared in the middle of the room. From within it emerged two of Everly's zombie servants, each one carrying a large basket filled with assorted cuts of meat which they both emptied onto the prone Fenneth after Everly pointed at her. Once they were finished, they took their baskets and left.

"What are you doing?" Discordia asked her.

"Shut up, I'm focusing," Everly said.

Holding up a hand, she gestured towards Fenn and focused. The meat began to liquify and wrap itself around the dead girl's ghostly form. Then a brilliant light surged around her, causing her to scream in surprise as the molded protein began to set in and reshape itself into a new body.

After a few short minutes of transmutation, when the smoke cleared away, Fenn was there, alive once more and naked on her knees, staring in awe at her newly restored flesh.

"I'm…I'm alive?" she asked, stunned by what had just occurred.

"Yes, wow, it's incredible, what a miracle," Everly said quickly before pushing Discordia against Fenn, causing her to trip over the newly resurrected girl. "You're fired, by the way, Dis."

"W-what do you mean?" Discordia asked her.

"Exactly that," Everly told her. "You and I are done finished with each other and now I'm dismissing you from my service. I've mastered healing magic thanks to having you around, but now that that's been achieved, what more do I gain from keeping you? Go back to your old mistress, I'm over it. Take as much time as you need to reorient yourselves. You can stay as long as you want."

"Everly…Everly, why have you done this?" Fenn asked her tearfully.

"Whimsy, and nothing more," Everly told her. "I take and take, but sometimes I give. Uh, I killed your grandmother by the way, and your family's ancestral afterlife was invaded by Eris. She's enslaved all of the residents therein and reduced the entire place to a negative space in the astral realm, so you might want to warn your remaining relatives to get right with the local religion because their free tickets to paradise just got clipped."

"You…you killed Anne?" Fenn asked her with wide-eyed shock.

"Congratulations on being reborn," Everly said hastily before exiting the room.

"Grandma…?" she thought she heard Fenn say.

"I'm never going to get over how weird that was," Everly muttered to Eris as she walked speedily away. "Seriously, Anne looked only a few years older than me!"

"Vampires are weird in general. It's best not to dwell," Eris said as she walked beside her mistress.

"Congratulations on your successful conquest, by the way," Everly said to her. "How are the Rat Room's newest tenants adjusting to their surroundings?"

"Slowly. Very, very slowly," Eris said with a wicked grin.

"Well, if that's not a heart-warming conclusion then I don't know what is," said Everly.

"There'll be no conclusion for them, ever. There's no stop button in the Rat Room," Eris beamed. "Just lots of hungry rats."

"Ha," Everly snickered. "Eris, you really are perfect as you are."

"Thank you, Everly. Pleasing you is all that I live for," Eris said with a delighted smile.

"Maybe it's not such a bad thing that my Four Everlys of the apocalypse scheme didn't pan out," Everly mused. "I still learned a lot from the experience. Most importantly, I learned that I already had a pretty good crew in place. Why complicate things needlessly? What works, works, and if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

"The others will be happy to hear you say that," Eris said.

"Speaking of which, where's Titania at? I haven't seen her in a bit."

"She's in the Rat Room," Eris told her.

"Really? What for?" asked Everly.

"She said she wanted to see an old friend of hers, if you can believe that." Eris smirked.

"Ha, it's probably a rat," Everly laughed.

"It's definitely a rat," Eris agreed.

It wasn't a rat.

__

"The thing that most upset me about your behavior, Aiden, is that you thought you'd get away with it," Titania said as she slowly approached the cringing figure of the man who had tormented her and her sister.

"Eris forgot all about you. Everyone did," she continued. "Everyone except me. I'm the earth itself, Aiden. I have never forgotten a face or a voice. Never. I recognized you at once when you were hiding in Lance. To me, you were still the same brat from all those years ago who tried to smother my mistress in her crib."

Titania loomed over the small man and her frown grew deeper. "Oh, Aiden. You have no idea how close to dying you came that day. For your actions, I would have crushed your father's entire house for the pleasure of watching your insignificant life end."

"I'm sorry!" Aiden wept. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

"Sorry doesn't cover it, worm," Titania told him. "Sorry doesn't nearly begin to cover what you owe. You should have just let it go, boy. After Everly dealt with you as you deserved, you should have just accepted it and moved on. If you had, you would still be in your little paradise with the rest of your miserable ancestors. Defeated, but still safe. But instead, you had to come back, didn't you?"

She then leaned forward and began tapping him on his cheek. "Right? Right, Aiden? You had to come back and play at being a hard man. You killed Cleverly, who was the blood of my mistress. You killed Tyler, a beloved of the blood of my mistress. You attempted to assert yourself over my sister and me and used power and knowledge that you didn't earn, but the greatest of your sins…was calling me a slave."

Aiden covered his head and wept, but Titania would have none of it. She grabbed him by his chin and forced him to look at her.

"Aiden…do I look like a slave to you?"

"No, no, no, this isn't my fault, this isn't my fault!" Aiden yelled. "This isn't my fault!"

"You're like an insolent child," Titania said contemptuously. "You've never changed. You'll never change. Even now, unable to escape what you have coming, unable to run away, and forced to look upon the ultimate ruin you've brought to your family, you still deny your culpability. Aiden, son of Marcis: you truly are a fool."

"It wasn't supposed to be like this!" Aiden whined. "Oh, gods, please, it wasn't supposed to be like this! Someone, please help me! Someone SAVE ME! I don't DESERVE THIS!"

"Fool. This is the only thing you deserve," Titania said as she walked out of the cell, slamming the door behind her.

It reopened a few minutes later, Aiden looked up, wondering if Titania had returned. She hadn't.

It was just the rats making their entrance.

"Heeeeey, Aiden! Heeeey!" said an ominous figure among them. One of the rats was walking on its hind legs and speaking. It was huge as well, with a swollen, distended belly, and patches of fur missing from its coat, revealing swathes of red-veined, infected-looking flesh, standing nearly a foot and a half tall.

"By the gods, what are you?" Aiden asked in a voice made numb by terror.

"Well, I'm Ratty the Rat and this is the Raaaaaat Room!" announced the abomination with its hideous, squeaky voice. "Lady Titania done whipped me into existence, she did! She did! And Lady Titania, she done told me that DEATH should never be the end of your suffering! HEE HEE HEE!"

"No, no, no, no," whimpered Aiden.

"Yeah, yeah, YEAH!" countered the dementedly cheerful Ratty the rat. "Here in the RAAAAT ROOM, the party never ends! NEVER! Bring your friends, bring your friends, BRING YOUR GODDAMN FRIENDS!" he cackled. Then he brought his paw to his mouth and somehow gave a sharp whistle that caused the other rats to gather around him.

"Start with his eyes and make your way down! Crawl inside his mouth and upon us he will drown! Get into his tummy and chew your way out! LET'S SHOW THIS LITTLE BASTARD WHAT THE RAT ROOM'S ALL ABOUT!"

"Gods forgive me!" Aiden screamed, but it was too late. Ratty the Rat was on him in an instant. Ratty with his wide mouth and yellow, broken teeth.

Just as Ratty promised, they got his eyes first. Then, one after the other, they were crawling down his throat to take the party inside.