(Major spoilers for Book 2) RO Bonus Story: Wind and Shelter (female Rin)

Major spoiler warning: I wrote this to be a longer-than-normal bonus story (explanation for why at the bottom). When I finished writing it, I realized it fit so well with Book 2 that I'm going to adapt it into the game.

If you want to avoid spoilers for Book 2 and for Rin's arc, I'd advise you to come back to this story later, after we've gotten about halfway through Leas: Fae Moon Rising.

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The forest is quiet. The only sounds are chirping crickets, a gentle breeze through the leaves, and me, hacking away with a machete at the enchanted tangle of plants in front of me.

“Hey!” I shout through the thicket. “Can you hear me?”

No answer comes. I let out a sharp breath of frustration but keep at it. The tangle in front of me is made of fae magic, the dead thorns and underbrush and vines too strong for their dull colors. But my blade is enchanted – I’m making a dent, I just have to keep trying, and hope to find Rin on the other side. I throw all my energy into it, and after a few minutes I’ve got a gap large enough to squeeze through.

I step into a tiny clearing, no more than ten feet at its widest point. Its uneven borders are ringed with the same natural barrier I just cut my way through. Simple to navigate with human magic and some stubbornness, but completely impassable without it. There’s a large tree at its center.

“Dalusin, you there?” I call, panting as I look around. I can’t use Rin’s actual name out here in the wilds so I default to her city’s name, like she sometimes does with me. I take a lap, scanning the area for any sign of her. “Dalu–”

I stop short as I round the corner of the tree and see a tiny human figure curled up into a ball, shoulders shaking with silent sobs. A child? I hesitate, half of me certain this is a fae trap – but the other part of me remembers how close we are to the city. There’s a chance this is real, and if so...

“Hello,” I say tentatively, kneeling a few feet away and readying a shielding spell, just in case. “How’d you get out here?”

The girl flinches like I’ve struck her. She raises her head with panicked eyes, legs instinctively pushing her back against the tree’s trunk. Her breathing is shallow and rapid, and she grabs at something hidden in her pocket.

“Whoa, easy,” I move back an inch myself, hands held palm-up to the sky in a gesture of peace. “I’m a friend.”

The girl scowls in a way that would make me laugh if this wasn’t so serious – it reminds me of Rin so much I’d almost mistake her for... Actually, she looks a lot like Rin. But her black hair is curly and her eyes are a shade darker, not such a light grey that I’d call them silver but instead like a storm cloud rolling in at monsoon season.

“Promise?” she hisses, loathing in her tone. It’s the only thing I’ve time to notice before she pulls a wicked-looking dagger from her pocket and lunges at me with a speed that’s almost inhuman. I release my shield just in time, and as the blade strikes it a flash of light erupts around us.

Everything goes white.

***

Where am I? I tug at the uncomfortable collar of my shirt and look around for either of my parents. I’m all dressed up to say goodbye at the main gates, the caravan there a sight I can’t help but hate for the way it’s taking half of my family away from me. It feels so unfair. And then on top of it I’m in this awful outfit. The neck is too snug and it itches. I don’t care how the grown-ups think it looks, I’m getting out of it as soon as I can sneak away and find something else to wear.

But nothing looks familiar. Where’s the market? I wonder, looking around as a twinge of fear runs through me. Why is everything so dark and green?

It doesn’t look like the desert at all. When I call out no voice replies. I start running, but the little grove I’m in is small and as constricting as my clothes and it’s empty. There's no one here to help me.

I burst into tears.

I can’t help it. I’m only six. I’m not supposed to be alone.

“Shut up!” a voice whispers behind me, a pale hand as tiny as my own covering my mouth. I start in shock, trying to turn but the person holds me in place. “I’ll let you go if you’re quiet.” she insists, her own voice barely audible. I take a stuttering breath, sniffling, and nod.

“Where are we? Why are we here?” I whisper when I turn and see the same girl from earlier. Wait – earlier? What happened earlier? I frown, confused as I try to figure out where I’ve seen her face before.

“Don’t you know?” the girl frowns back, as puzzled as me. “Did she just find you today?”

“Who’s ‘she?’” I ask. “I was in the market, I don't know how I got here. Are we...” I look around again, listening for people, civilization, any sign of human life and hearing none. My eyes go big and wide. “Are we in the wilds?” I gasp, excitement and fear mingling in my tone, both strengthened when she nods grimly.

“If anything comes, kill it,” she tells me, serious like the teenagers in the neighborhood when they tell me something’s dangerous. It’s kind of annoying – she’s the same age as me. But there’s an experience in her voice that makes me listen anyway.

Wait, did she say ‘kill?’ I laugh quietly. She can’t be serious, this must be a game. But she doesn’t smile back at me. And she’s holding a knife.

“I... I want to go home,” I say, my tears threatening to return.

A flash of pain crosses the girl’s face, and for a moment I think she feels exactly the same way. I see the same youth in her eyes, the same fear that makes me want to help, she’s so small, even for a kid her age – no, my age. My... age? 

“Gods, my head feels weird,” I say, for a moment an Agent of Den Zarel again as the world flickers around me.

“Too bad,” the girl snaps, clenching her jaw and forcing her expression into something tough and mean again. I don’t feel myself shrink back to a child’s body, but somehow I’m small again. It’s hard to remember what I was before, but I think I’m starting to piece together what’s happening.

“This place,” I look up at the way the lowest branches of the tree are out of my reach now. “It’s making me younger. It’s an illusion.”

“She makes you see things here,” the girl says, her thumb picking at the hilt of her blade, the only sign of fear left in her. “Don’t trust anything. Don’t make a promise. And don’t let her hear you.”

A slow wind begins to blow so coldly it cuts through my clothes and seeps into my bones. I stagger, reaching out as my knees give way, like the life’s been pulled from them. The girl steadies me, and without missing a beat hauls me towards the tree. She sets me down, pulls a vial of deep red blood from her boot and lets two drops fall between its roots. Its trunk splits, utterly silent, and she pulls me in.

I’d think I was looking at a veteran agent, if I didn’t know better.

It’s quiet inside when the tree closes up again. There’s a tiny gap through which I can see the grove, but it feels safe from the wind in here.

“That felt like I was dying,” I say, unsure if it’s the child or adult in me responsible for the fear in my voice. “What was it? And how did you find this safe house?”

“Don’t talk so much,” she snaps back. “It’s not totally safe, not even here. We have to be quiet so she doesn’t notice us.”

“No,” I murmur, staring out through the crack. “No, this is... We can break out of this. It’s a mind-trap, a fae trick – I can get us out.” The bark I’m standing against begins to bite at my back as my body begins to grow again. I’m almost too big to be in here, not yet adult-sized and still going.

“I’ve got to get out of here, or I’ll get stuck,” I tell her, and slip outside.

“No!” Some distant part of me is impressed at the way she still manages to keep her scream quiet. She looks desperate, reaching out for me with wild eyes but not daring to cross the threshold of the tree’s trunk. And I can see why; the force of the wind that hits me is frighteningly strong. I don’t know what would happen if I’d stepped out unprepared, and I’m not sure I want to know. I focus instead on countering it, finding the parts where its magic is weakest and flooding my own spell into those places.

It’s hard, and it takes what feels like forever. But the end result is a still, peaceful space.

“Come on,” I bend down, my full size and self again, and offer the little girl a hand. She hesitates so long I begin to worry something went wrong and she’s paralyzed – but then carefully, slowly, she reaches out and takes my hand. I give her an encouraging smile and help her step out from the tree, her hand so small mine wraps around it completely with room left over. She’s a year or so older than Lono but stands even smaller... and my gut feels uneasy as that image crosses my mind. 

“I really hope that’s not the next illusion I see,” I mutter under my breath. Whether this is real or not, I’m not sure I can handle two terrified-kids-in-the-wilds in a day. It’s an effective fae tactic, though hopefully not one I’ll see more of soon. It takes a lot of energy for fae to imitate humans, let alone to manipulate our minds enough to convince us we’re children.

And given what I just experienced, I don't think I'm the only one who's been temporarily turned into a child. “Alright, are you ready to grow up again?” I ask the girl, fairly certain she’s Rin’s version of the kid I was a moment ago - though the appearance thing is still odd.

But instead of shifting the way I had a moment ago, her image flickers and distorts. She looks up at me, terrified, and winks away into nothing. A breeze floats by in a soft gust, harmless save for a low, ugly laugh carried on it.

“Oh, fuck, thank the gods,” a familiar feminine voice pants behind me, the sound of falling twigs and leaves accompanying it. I turn, and see Rin cutting her way through the border of the clearing. “You alright, Leas?”

I turn back, and the girl’s nowhere in sight. “Then... it wasn’t you,” I frown, more confused than ever.

“What wasn’t me?”

“There was a girl, she–” I stop, shaking my head. “It must’ve been an illusion. She just seemed so real.” 

“I told you this part of the forest is full of stuff like that,” she says pointedly. “Are you injured?”

“No, I’m not. Really, I’m not,” I assure her as she puts her hands on my arms and looks me up and down for herself. “I’m just a little disoriented. I’ve never seen an illusion that felt like that, it was like talking to an actual living child. No tells, no hints that it was secretly a fae...”

Rin sighs. “Look, you’ve got rules for different regions of your desert’s wilds, yeah? The best rule here is if anything comes for you, kill it. You’ll go crazy if you don't.”

“That’s what the girl said,” I murmur, staring at the tree. “She opened it, we went inside...” But there’s no sign of the gap in its bark, or trace of the blood that fell on its roots.

I feel Rin’s hands tighten on me, and look back at her. “Focus,” she says, her voice low and strained. “We just need to keep moving.”

I follow her out of the trap’s realm, stopping just once to check if the girl reappears. But there’s only the dead and cut branches behind us.

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A note on length: This story is much longer than most of the RO Bonus Stories. It's for sentimental reasons. Eiwynn's favorite was fem!Rin, and releasing this story first and making it longer and plot-relevant is one of the many ways I'm processing. The other two will be of normal length, so I wanted to include an explanation for you guys as to why. <3