I ACCIDENTALLY MARRIED A DUNGEON

The last of the dungeon came down in a slow exhale of dust and settling stone, the entrance collapsing inward until there was nothing left but a depression in the hillside and a pale cloud hanging in the morning air. Felix watched it thin out and disappear, then looked up at the sky. Still early. The light came through clean and direct now, the fog gone, the sun high enough that the morning was slipping toward midday.

He couldn’t afford to stand here. The day had just started and jobs were waiting for him.

"Alright." He turned toward the forest. "Let’s head back."

Mira fell into step beside him, her shoulders dropping slightly.

The forest was different coming out than going in. The fog had burned off while they were underground and the light came through the canopy in clean angled columns, picking out the moss on the older trunks and the small stones half buried in the path. Their boots found the root systems by memory.

Neither of them spoke.

The birds had come back to this part of the forest, small sounds moving through the upper branches, and the air smelled like wet earth and pine.

Felix suddenly got the fluctuations of his Numen. His Numen had started responding to something. It was an unusual occurrence for Felix, but he knew it was one of the reasons that this occurred because somebody was following him through his traces of Numen.

Who the fuck is after me now? Can’t I have one goddamn peaceful morning?

His legs were getting quicker despite himself.

Mira fell a little bit behind. "Felix!"

He made no response.

She sped up. "Why are you in such a hurry?"

"I think we’ve got someone tailing us," he replied.

"What?" Mira looked back and froze.

Felix needed a minute to figure out that Mira had frozen.

"Mira...?" He spoke through clenched teeth and turned around slowly.

A figure stood in the path roughly at a metre distance.

She was wrapped in worn black cloth that hung loose around a thin frame, her feet bare against the forest floor. Her hair was long, black, falling past her neck. Her arms were slight and her face was young, and across her skin ran black markings that branched and spread like cracks in dried earth, running up her neck and across her cheekbones and disappearing into her hairline.

Mira stumbled backward. Felix’s mouth went dry.

That face. I saw it. In that room, in the middle of everything. What does she want?

The figure’s eyes were fixed on him. Her expression didn’t move. She began walking toward him, bare feet pressing dry leaves flat without a sound, closing the distance between them.

Felix told his legs to move. They didn’t. Everything from the waist down had stopped responding entirely, rooted to the path like the trees on either side of it.

She stopped directly in front of him. Her hands rose slowly, found either side of his face, and pulled his head down. He had exactly enough time to register what was happening before her lips met his.

Felix’s brain produced nothing useful for approximately two seconds. Only the taste of her soft lips.

Then he wrenched his head sideways and took three fast steps back, nearly tripping over a root. He dragged his sleeve across his mouth and stared at her.

"What the hell... you doing?"

She tilted her head slightly. "Is that not how humans strengthen a connection?"

"W-what?" Felix found her question absurd.

I genuinely thought I was about to die. And she’s asking me about human intimacy.

"That is what I have always heard from other humans.".

"And where exactly did you hear that?"

She glanced back over her shoulder toward the rubble. "Inside."

Mira stood frozen for another second then crossed quickly to Felix and stepped behind him. "You know her?" she whispered.

"No. No." Felix kept his eyes on the figure. "First time seeing her."

"You saw me inside the ritual chamber," the figure said.

"I don’t know what ritual chamber you’re talking about." Felix turned his head slightly toward Mira and lowered his voice. "I think she’s some kind of human looking monster. Like a succubus or something."

Mira nodded slowly, her eyes not leaving the figure. "Yeah. Normal people don’t just kiss someone randomly." She straightened and raised her voice. "W-what do you want from us? The ores? Our lives?"

"Felix." She said, "I want to strengthen my connection with Felix."

Mira looked at him.

She’s definitely a succubus. But she doesn’t look like the illustrations in any book I’ve read. And they don’t act this calm. If she’s this composed she must be very powerful.

Felix’s hand slid into his pocket, fingers finding the edges of his cards. He didn’t sense anything threatening coming off her. No killing intent, no Numen pressure, nothing that explained why his legs had stopped working a minute ago. Just her standing there looking at him with that same still expression.

Why does she seem familiar?

"Who are you," he said. "And why are you following me?"

She turned and looked back at the collapsed hillside, the dust still settling across the flattened stones where the entrance used to be. Then she looked at him again.

"I was that. A moment ago."

Felix and Mira exchange confused looks.

"He completed the ancient rite of binding within my chamber. We are now bound by a spirit contract. I will follow where he goes."

"Huh? I didn’t do anything."

"You brought the offerings. You channeled your essence into the binding marks. The seal recognized the offering."

"I’m broke as hell. What offering are you talking about?"

"It can be anything. But what matters is the one who offers it. You did. Therefore the union stands. You to me. Me to you." She paused. "We are Veth’ari now. Bound by soul contract under spirit law. Unbreakable. Permanent. Witnessed by the seal itself."

"The—what?" Mira blurted out.

"Veth’ari." She said it again.. "It is the oldest form of binding. Created by the Dominator of sealing magic. You would have no word for it. The closest your tongue manages is marriage."

Felix opened his mouth but didn’t know what to say.

"A marriage with a dungeon?" Mira turned to him in disbelief. "What the hell did you do inside?"

Felix ignored Mira and asked the figure, "It can be undone right?"

She considered this. Her eyes moved past him, then to Mira and settled there.

"No."

"No?" Felix repeated. "Then I’ll take the divorce."

"We cannot be separated by any means," she said. Then added, "Until you die."

Felix pulled a card from his pocket and looked at it. Seven of diamonds. He stared at it for a long moment.

"I knew it," he said.

Mira turned to him. "What did you know?"

"Anthony’s work."

"Your older brother? The one working for the aristocrats?"

"Yeah. That damn weasel." Felix pocketed the card. "Last time he showed up at my house he wanted it signed over to him and offered me a pittance. Didn’t push too hard because Grandpa already put the deed under my name but apparently that wasn’t enough. Didn’t know he’d sink this low." He spat on the ground. "Pathetic."

He turned toward the forest path. "Let’s head back. She’ll return to whoever sent her."

"If you say so." Mira glanced back at the figure once before following him.

They walked for ten minutes through the thinning trees, the forest edge visible ahead where the light opened up into the road, and Felix had almost convinced himself the morning was salvageable when he stopped and turned around.

She was three metres behind them. Bare feet. Same expression.

"Didn’t I tell you to stop following us?" His voice came out flat. "Can’t you understand human language?"

"I can," she said. "But we cannot be separated. I will follow wherever you go." She paused. "We must strengthen our relationship."

Felix’s face twisted. He looked at the sky briefly, then back at her.

"Fine. Do whatever you want."

He turned back toward the road and kept walking.