When Lycoris woke up, her entire body stung painfully, soreness and mild nausea mingling together into an unpleasant cocktail that made her want to squeeze her eyes shut and roll over in bed.

  “Mmn… Surely Mizar would let me sleep another twelve hours…” She mumbled drowsily.

  “Who’s Mizar?”

  “Shhhh, don’t wake her up! Do you want her to tear your head off!?”

  “You’re going to wake her up if you keep that up!”

  A pair of unfamiliar voices muttered in hushed whispers nearby, though Lycoris felt so worn down, she barely registered what that even implied.

  Hot breath tickled her cheek, and a warm, flat tongue prodded her forehead until she finally opened her stinging eyes.

  “Mmggh… Okay okay, fine…”

  She wearily rubbed the sleep from her drowsy lids, feeling the weight of cold iron on her wrists. The wrongness of it caused a jolt of panic to course through her, forcing her to sit bolt upright. Dragging her gaze slowly across the room, the pit of Lycoris’s stomach sank into the floor.

  Gathered in smaller cliques resting around the shelter with their backs against the walls or storage crates, several Vampires and Fangchasers stared in Lycoris’s direction. Not all of them, though; some were still talking among themselves, or looked like they were sleeping.

  There also appeared to be a ring of… tin cans around her and Mira. Like a warding circle to keep away the spirits of the dead, or perhaps like an offering to a pagan god.

  But more important than the blasphemous notion of her being worshipped, Lycoris timidly returned the agog stares of those who saw her awaken. Or, perhaps it was dread they looked on with, rather than anticipation.

  …Did they hear me mumbling about Mizar? I sure hope not… No, wait, they don’t even know who he was—is. I’ll be fine. Er, right. Elegance, composure, superiority. Stay calm, Lyco, you haven’t botched this yet, I think.

  Lycoris glanced down at herself, looking at the stains on her blouse and shorts and tutting, and then at the bangles still wrapped around her. Her wrists ached and burned—it was probably unhealthy to have these cuffs on for so long—but the moment she reached for one of them, a pang of terror gripped her heart as she heard a distant thud and static-y groan.

  Perhaps it was a boon that her mana was sealed off, at the moment.

  Enduring the ache coursing through her body, the little princess carefully wobbled up to her feet and folded her hands in front of her as she looked on, the whispers of the crowd starting up as more people woke up their families and companions. There seemed to be about fifty people in this shelter, the majority of them fluffy-eared Fangchasers.

  Her attention was pulled toward a small group that were staying near and keeping watch over a pair of unconscious women laid out on thin sheets of cloth.

  “Sera! Athena!”

  Forgetting her manners, Lycoris rushed out of the encirclement, kicking cans over and startling the myrh as she beelined for her sleeping companions. She immediately crouched down beside Athena, placing a hand to her cheek. It was still warm…

  Relief flooded through her, but her anxiety didn’t fully abate just because of that.

  Looking up from the maid to the furry-eared woman staring rather nervously at her, Lycoris entreated,

  “Do you know what happened to them? I thought they would have awakened by now.”

  “My apologies… Y-Your Highness, but, um… It seems to be a state of torpor.”

  Lycoris felt her chest tighten. “T…Torpor? What does that mean? Will they be okay?”

  “Vampire, um… physiology is fairly complex. B-But basically they uh, well, as Vampires put it, their minds have been taken by your Ancestors and are, er… They—”

  “Oh for the love of, shut up and sit back. You’re only going to stress Her Highness out.”

  Someone else—a Vampire with a bandage wrapped around his head and his arm in a sling—elbowed the Fangchaser out of the way and knelt down before Lycoris, bowing his shaggy red-haired head low.

  “My name is Varilas Crux, Your Highness. We are all eternally grateful for your presence. Truly your visage inspires—”

  “Cease prattling and spit it out already,” Lycoris cut over him, his voice immediately causing a spike of irritation to subsume the anxiety gripping her heart.

  Bizarrely, Varilas seemed almost pleased by that response. “But of course. My apologies, Your Highness. They are in a state of torpor, meaning they are unconscious, but as you are well aware, we Vampires do not require oxygen for our minds to function. Instead, I would say it is more of… a spiritual state of unconsciousness, where the spirit is severed from the flesh. Typically, the condition is caused by a sudden extreme disruption in one’s mana flow. Incidentally, does Your Highness believe that we will be—”

  “How do we wake them back up? How long do they have?”

  “Erm… Well, I’m… Forgive my foolishness, but who are these two to Your Highness?”

  “My friends. If you don’t know, say so, and then find someone who does.”

  In the silence following in the wake of her words, Lycoris heard Mira stand up and knock aside some more of the cans as the myrh wandered toward a group of Fangchasers eating some food. There was a small commotion as it tried to snap one of their biscuits out of their hands, but a moment later there was the sound of happy chirping.

  “Your… friends.”

  “Do you consider it your business who I befriend? Do you consider yourself equal to my mother? I notice you haven’t answered the questions I’ve posed yet. I’m still worried about them, Varilas.”

  Lycoris felt her temper rise at his overly dramatic and unnecessary flamboyance, and how slow he was on the uptake. She also noticed his eyes roll down to the black bangles on her wrists, before he closed them and bowed his head again.

  “I would never dare even think such an absurd thing, Your Highness. I do not know how to treat torpor, but a doctor might be able to do something with actual equipment. As for how long they have… that depends on the thickness of their blood. Those who awaken from torpor often report, and are indeed found to be, frailer and less capable of magecraft. Most common folk only last a few weeks, while the more noble among our kind can endure for years, though… those who awaken often wish they hadn’t. There’s an old tale of—”

  “You’re telling me that whatever poison did this is… going to sap their strength until they die unless they wake up?”

  “Y…Yes, I suppose I am.”

  Lycoris’s arms shook as she clenched her hands, a trickle of blood splattering to the floor as her self-inflicted wound re-opened itself. She ignored the pain, instead stepping over the unconscious women and gripping Varilas by the collar. There was no way she could hoist him up, but wrinkling the stupid collar of his awful beige coat was at least mildly cathartic.

  “Then we bring them to a house of healing. Where is the nearest one?”

  “A… house of healing, Your Highness?”

  “Yes you know, somewhere that can tend to their injuries. Please, you should be far more familiar with the concept than I.”

  The others in the shelter began gathering in larger groups as they watched the spectacle, while the contented myrh sauntered back toward the Princess. It idly bumped its beak against her bleeding palm, pushing its way forward as it nuzzled against her side and pulled her attention away from the confusing sycophant.

  “Bwerk.”

  “Huh? What’s wrong, Mira? Oh, my hand…”

  “Wark.”

  She pulled her hand back and wiped the myrh’s beak clean with her other palm. The bird…horse, let out another happy trill as she stroked its beak.

  No, it really wasn’t anything like a horse at all. This creature was far more loyal, adorable, capable and majestic. Plus, it seemed remarkably intelligent, for a beast of burden.

  Lycoris gave it a little scratch under the chin as she turned back to the man, her expression hardening once more.

  “Well?”

  “I… erm, if you mean a hospital, I believe there’s one a kilometer or so away. But there is no guarantee that it’ll still be standing, or that they’d be willing to take you in, or… that any of these people would make it there.”

  “Huh? When did I say anything about taking others with me? Also, Plainstriders and Vampires should be more than a match for some roaming Whispers, surely…”

  “Unarmed? And injured? …plus, none present are really… fighters. Aside from the one cop over there in the corner.”

  He gestured to the one man in a guard uniform, sitting cross-legged with his back to a stack of crates. The man in uniform was another dour-faced Fangchaser, with much more natural (by Lycoris’s former human standards) autumn-brown hair and dark eyes. His sullen stare was fixed on the phone in his hand, though he wasn’t interacting with it in any way. Just, staring.

  Lycoris was regrettably familiar with that sort of withdrawn and zombified gaze. In a word, he was dispirited.

  There were any number of probable causes, but given the circumstances, he’d likely lost someone important in the crisis. Lycoris had always rationalized how hard it had to be, to go through such a thing; but now, imagining her mother—impossible as it sounded—or even just the two women in torpor laying peacefully beneath her, to be taken from her so suddenly…

  “I don’t think he’ll be of any use to us,” she quietly muttered, a strange mixture of mercy and cold calculation in her tone.

  Varilas shook his head and adjusted a lock of hair on his brow. “Of course not. That is, after all, my point. I have no doubt that Your Highness measures everything by the metrics of Her Majesty and yourself, but… the truth is… I, and the others here, were hoping that you had come to rescue us.”

  “I—”

  Lycoris stopped herself before reflexively calling him a buffoon. That was why she had come here—not to the town, but to the County in general. She was supposed to be a symbol of hope for these people.

  And yet, here she was being unreasonable and putting her own selfish priorities forward, when they were all in this shelter not for comfort, but out of desperation.

  She still wasn’t sure how moral it was to be saving Vampires and their ilk, when every life saved here was another who-knows-how-many Human lives lost, but looking around the half-empty shelter again… she didn’t see anything resembling the monsters that so often marched on Dauwen.

  Just people. Scared, worried, and lonely people.

  Her people.

  “Right, of course,” she muttered inaudibly to herself.

  Taking a deep breath—much to Varilas’s confusion—Lycoris stretched her shoulders and briefly limbered herself up, slapping her cheeks to chase away the aches and fatigue hounding her still. She’d probably feel much better if she removed the bracelets, but doing so would be a risk. She didn’t want to have to carve her way out of the shelter when she eventually left, or endanger the people here by drawing a bunch of Whispers with her potent supply of mana.

  She turned away from the conceited redhead and her friends. Approaching a stack of crates near the center of the room, she grunted while clambering up it—getting a little boost from Mira.

  After making it to higher ground, she adjusted her clothing—though there wasn’t anything she could do about the bloodstains—and cleared her throat loudly enough to draw the attention of everyone who wasn’t already observing her.

  “My… My subjects, pray lend me your ears. I am Princess Lycoris Aster Aphtangloa, the… Heir-Significate. I am sure you all know who my mother is, regardless of where in the Empire you hail from, and perhaps many of you already know of myself as well. As my presence here indicates, we have not abandoned you. I came to Condore in order to oversee the efforts to rescue those in Kranes. That being the case, I… had no intention of coming to Kranes personally. My presence here, in this town, in this shelter, is a mistake…”

  Lycoris paused, putting a hand to her chest where Mizar rested beneath her blouse.

  The crowd murmured, restlessness beginning to spread from her honest admission.

  “However, regardless of the circumstances that brought me here, I will do my utmost to guarantee your safety. That is my responsibility as a ruler. There are those here that are dear to me, and in a dire circumstance. I want to save them, too.”

  She clenched her hands, a thin trickle of blue running down and staining the sleeve of her dress.

  “Seeing as the Godde—err… Ancestors have sent me here, I shall resolve this issue personally. I have no doubt that we all wish to return to our regular lives as soon as possible. To that end, I would ask those who think themselves capable fighters to accompany me. Those who think themselves too frail, in body or spirit, should remain in the shelter until the situation is resolved.”

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  As Lycoris met the gaze of several members of the crowd, a discontented voice from an elderly person rang out.

  “You intend to abandon us here!”

  “It is for your own safety that—”

  “Why’d you even come here if it wasn’t to get us out!?”

  “As I said, it was unintentional… But have no fear that you will all be free to go in due time, once the threat has passed.”

  “Feh. I bet you’re just here to take all the Vampires out and leave the rest of us to rot!”

  “I… Huh?”

  Several other members of the crowd began chiming in, raising their objections to Lycoris’s plan and questioning her values. The girl looked around at the angry faces in confusion, oblivious to the source of their frustrations.

  All she had suggested was the most rational course of action. But they were too anxious and afraid to trust her. Perhaps it was a fair point, they had no way of knowing what sort of person she was, given it had only been a couple days since her first public appearance.

  Clearing her throat, she shouted, “Silence! …I understand your fear. But I would not put you in unnecessary danger. I cannot guarantee your safety if you leave this shelter. But I will return with—”

  “Uh-huh, and just when have you ever done anything for us!? The fact we’re even living in this town to begin with is—”

  “Shut your mouth and know your place.”

  Lycoris blinked, dumbfounded by Varilas’s harsh words on her behalf. An uneasy tension began to fill the air, as he looked ready to assault the woman speaking back at Lycoris.

  Some of the other Fangchasers stood up opposite him, cracking their knuckles or tapping whatever implement they could find against the ground. Vampires mirrored the gesture, a pair flanking Varilas on either side.

  “Would you prefer that she drag you through the city instead, then!?”

  “Drag us through the hells, for all I care! We’ve got sick and injured here, and we’re supposed to just let her walk out with all the guns and spears?” A Fangchaser shouted back, reaching to protectively cover the gun at his hip.

  “Speaking back against the Aphtangloa is a crime punishable by death.”

  “Uh-huh, I think we’re all gonna bite it anyways, so what’s the harm in being honest?”

  Lycoris clenched her fist, feeling a sting of pain from her wound. She doubted she could protect everyone in here on her own; she wasn’t even sure she could make it on her own if the Whispers bogged her down. Even if she was still as strong as she had been as a full-bodied adult, all it took was fatigue or a lucky strike to wear her down past the point of being able to fight back.

  But the people here already felt abandoned, and she had to do what she could to keep them from tearing each others’ throats out. If all she did was cause an argument to break out and grow violent, it’d fly in the face of everything she had ever done with her life. At the same time, if bloodshed was the only outcome left, better that she clean up whatever trash wanted to pick a fight herself. At least that would minimize unnecessary casualties.

  “If you do not wish to stay here, then listen! My goal is the nearest hospital. I intend to rally whatever guards and take whatever weapons I can from there to begin excising the Whispers from our land. If you think I will abandon you here, then I will not stop you from following me out of the shelter! But I cannot guarantee everyone’s safety on my own; I am but a single person, and there are far too many of those abominations out there.”

  “So you want to use us as meatshields then!?”

  One of the Vampires snapped back, “You should be on your hands and knees begging for her to consider using you as her tool.”

  “Both of you, shut it!” Lycoris reached for one of the bracelets on her wrist, though nobody seemed to react to the implicit threat until she continued, “If you want to twist my words into the most negative way possible at every turn, then perhaps you would rather I simply lop off your head now and save us all the trouble and oxygen!?”

  “Well said, Your High—”

  “That goes for you too, Vampire,” she hissed at Varilas.

  After cutting him off, she used the silence to glower at the Fangchasers who’d talked back at her and the Vampires who had risen unbidden to her defense. Hardening her expression and moving her bloody hand from her shackle to her chest again, she softened her tone and entreated the shelter’s residents.

  “I would prefer that nobody here throw their life away meaninglessly. Even those joining me in the front, I would only ask that you serve as backup for me. My wish is that you all can see those you love once more. I have every intention of seeing all of us make it through this alive. I have no intention to abandon even a single soul! I’m sure it might be hard to believe, seeing how small I am, but… Will anyone else join me? Who else will stand up and fight to protect those who cannot!?”

  “…I will.”

  The first to speak up was the guard Lycoris had spied earlier. His cheeks were ever so slightly puffy, his brown eyes shining with dark luster. It seemed her words had resonated with the Fangchaser.

  Seeing him step forward, one of the critics shrugged his shoulders and flashed a fangy grin.

  “Like she said, if we wanna make it through this, we gotta be willing to fight. No sense raising a stink if we’re just gonna sit around anyways. She’s offering us a way outta here, so either we put up or shut up!”

  “We don’t have much in the way of arms or armor here, though!” Another from the crowd cried out.

  “Just tear up some boxes and use that. Hells, I’m big enough that you could just use me as a shield!”

  “I bet I could sharpen something into a spear maybe.”

  “You still have that gun, right?”

  “Well, yes but I figured you would want to use it, you’ve always been a better shot than me.”

  “Er, I did make it clear I was going to be doing most of the fighting, yes…?” Lycoris muttered under the chattering crowd.

  “Hey if we’re going to be moving everyone out of here, we’ll need at least some people to help the infirm walk.”

  “Maybe instead of a shield, we can use pieces of these crates here for crutches?”

  “Yeah… Or a gurney maybe.”

  “Just carry them on your back!”

  The crowd gathered in front of her makeshift podium, excitedly talking themselves up without Lycoris having to utter another line. Considering how dispirited and disgruntled everyone looked before, she was surprised how pronounced of an effect she had, but… it seemed no matter who they were, Vampire or Fangchaser, the goodness in peoples’ hearts compelled them to help each other in a time of crisis. All it took was a little match to ignite their hopes…

  “I did say it would be better to stay, but… Well, I suppose I can let them settle down first before hashing out a plan.”

  “Bwork.”

  “Hm?”

  Lycoris turned around to see Mira staring directly up at her, ruffling its tail feathers and seeming rather irritated (for a bird-headed cat-like horse) by the man clearing his throat repeatedly a few paces further away.

  “Varilas?”

  “That was a rousing speech, Your Highness. I apologize for their boorish reception. But, ah… well… You might have forgotten one thing.”

  As the loudmouth orated up to Lycoris, the crowd gradually cooled their rising excitement to listen, a wariness filling the space between.

  Lycoris similarly tensed up, prepared for him to suddenly announce his betrayal, that he was working for Tatyana the whole time, or something that would incense the crowd once more and—

  “It’s still midday. Going outside would, quite literally, be suicidal.”

  “…Huh?”

  “The cloud generator is inoperable, Your Highness. I thought you would’ve noticed last night. I suppose you were in quite a way.”

  To be honest, she still was. Lycoris was just powering through by straining herself and forcing her body to remain taut and focused, like a string on the verge of snapping.

  But as Varilas uttered the truth that the innocent Vampire Princess forgot, the excitement in the room deflated.

  “Oh yeah…”

  “You know, I totally forgot you couldn’t go out during the day.”

  “Hmph, and here Vampires consider themselves to be soooo superior.”

  “Hey c’mon, don’t be like that. She was literally just about to march out there for your sake.”

  “She was about to head out without us.”

  “Don’t make another scene in front of Her Highness!”

  “Yeah, do you remember what she did to that one guy?”

  Like a waterwheel suffering from a sudden overgrowth of ivy, the agreeable mood abruptly stiffened as more arguing gummed up the works. On the bright side, at least it sounded more subdued now that it was clear she wasn’t intending to leave anyone behind.

  She wasn’t sure what they meant by “did to that one guy,” though.

  “I admit, I… was a little overexcited and forgot that detail. However,” Lycoris turned away from Varilas, but not before shooting him a rather murderous glare, “That doesn’t mean we can’t formulate a plan for this evening. And if anything, this allows us more time to prepare ourselves. That’s a good thing, right? We are all in this together, there is no reason to decry your neighbor for something outside of their control.”

  She certainly couldn’t control what she had become.

  “That’s… true, I guess.”

  “Sorry, just uh. Tensions kinda running high, I guess.” One of the Fangchasers rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly.

  “Her Highness is right, let’s get to work taking apart these crates and scrounging up whatever’s useful. Not like we’ll need the supplies once we’re making our escape.”

  “Fair enough. Pass me that crowbar, I’ll start prying this one open.”

  Watching them all set to work helping each other out, Lycoris was struck with a sudden thought.

  Even if these people had the potential to do untold harm to humankind, she’d just proven how easy it was for her to influence how they applied their energy. After all, she just defused a potential brawl between Fangchaser and Vampire, and set them to working together. What if she could apply that to more than just the factions under the Empire’s banner?

  She couldn’t ignore that… by some twisted miracle, she was their leader now. And as such, it naturally fell to her to act as their guide. Maybe instead of destruction, she could lead them away from the wrong path, or at least do what she could to minimize senseless loss of life. Lycoris realized that the world wasn’t so zero-sum, that there had to be an answer that satisfied both the Kingdom and the Empire. Something that would be for the best of everyone.

  Lycoris could do better. She had to do better. Wasn’t that why her mother chose her to begin with?

  Feeling a small seedling of pride sprout in her heart, Lycoris slowly climbed off of the boxes and down onto the soft back of her wonderfully loyal steed, giving Mira a gentle rub on the neck.

  “Crrrroo~”

  “U-Um, Your Highness?”

  “Mm? Yes, what is it?”

  She turned to look at a nervous pair of Vampire girls, one appearing more or less her age, and the other seeming to be in her teens… or whatever the equivalent was. They must have been sisters, given they both had matching forest-green hair and bright golden eyes.

  In their hands were some tin cans, tall and thin like the ones that were set up in a circle around her and Mira when she awoke. The smaller girl held up hers, offering it to Lycoris while the older of the two spoke.

  “Oh, why thank you young—wait, I suppose we’re the same age, aren't we?”

  “I… realize it isn’t… it’s probably… I mean, there’s no way offering food like this to nobility is anything but an insult… especially a princess, but,”

  “It’s all we have here. Big Sis said it’s especially bad to skip meals at times like this. ‘Growing girls gotta make sure they keep nourished and energized!’”

  “Cecily, shush! …I’m sure you must be hungry, Your Highness. Please forgive the discourtesy of such a paltry offering, but…”

  Lycoris glanced down at the cold tin can in her hand, an uncomfortable sensation bubbling up in her gut.

  The sisters must have interpreted her silence as confusion, because—despite her obvious timidness—the younger sister walked up to the side of Mira and lifted up her own can for Lycoris to watch.

  “U-Um, you… pull this little tab here, then you shake it a bunch… and then you peel the top off! If you don’t shake it really good, the flavor ends up being weird…”

  “This is…”

  “Oh dear. Cecily, come here!”

  “Waah~”

  The older sister rushed forward and pulled Cecily behind her, before bowing her head toward Lycoris.

  “I-I apologize if this is out of line, but with how you looked when you arrived… I-I-I think you should rest and drink, for now. We’re… all counting on you, after all. Um, if you need someone to help clean you up… N-No, nevermind. May our Ancestors watch over you, Princess.”

  “Right…”

  The pair of girls wandered off as Lycoris stared at them in a mild daze. She hadn’t even thought to ask the older sister for her name, her muddled and tired thoughts so distracted by the realization she’d been cut off from her source of (foul-tasting) nourishment.

  Varilas shook his head and sighed loud enough to project his voice to the pair of girls, a holier-than-thou look of pity on his face as he gazed at their backs. Somehow, he still looked kinder than when he was addressing or looking at the wolf-eared folk.

  “Hmph. They should know better than to approach royalty so flippantly. Stacking cans around Her Highness like it’s some kind of game of annoy-the-myrh… If I didn’t have better things to do I’d…”

  While grumbling to himself, perhaps forgetting Lycoris was even right there and listening to him, Varilas walked off back toward the group hard at work. No doubt to play the part of armchair manager, given that he wouldn’t be able to do physical labor with his broken arm and wounded head.

  Which left Lycoris alone with the can of… liquid Vampire food.

  “Do I really have to…”

  “Craw.”

  Okay, not-quite-alone.

  The myrh cawed reproachfully, and her stomach grumbled to protest her reluctance. Her noble companion ferried her back toward the now-scattered circle of cans where they had rested, while she stared at the can in scorn. Perhaps she hoped she could suddenly vaporize it with her vision, so she wouldn’t have to agonize over what to do with it.

  “Maybe I should just… hand it back and ask them to clean my clothing up instead…”

  “Brawk.”

  “I know… I know, damn it! You don’t have to tell me that.”

  With a heavy heart and several words placed in the myrh’s mouth, she pinched the tab off the can with antipathy.