Hadrian’s fiery rage ran against the mental asbestos that was information scarcity.

The desire to go after the Wizard, spells and blades brandished, couldn’t be realized without knowing the Wizard’s location, and the Wizard had left behind few clues. The locations of the four temples that’d been destroyed–or, rather, three temples and a holy site–didn’t seem to show any pattern, though given his power, it seemed likely he could teleport at will.

The primary captives, two high priests, one ‘grand’ priest, and a merchant with a series of divine connections, hadn’t been able to send for help or signal their locations. Nor had the others who were taken. Nothing else was missing, he hadn’t taken any relics or valuables. He’d stolen only people.

There was no satisfying-but-impossible revenge to be had. The only way to help the situation was to help.

And so, they did what they could. Counterspells were largely out of their repertoire, but there were people who needed aid, and Sandra’s party were able to give that aid.

A team of clerics working on magic to unlock the pacifier-feeder-brain-corrupting gags needed reagents and supplies, Sandra or Quinn could run and go get them. Hadrian knew more about the Wizard’s magic than most, and could provide detailed lore and insight into the ways of paraphilic magic. Tarja could only walk and exert fine motor control for ten minutes at a time, and doing so required her to wet her diaper, limiting how often she could make it happen, but she could still read books of magic and look up citations, still offer insights into healing and medicine, still make food and fetch water.

All hands could help, and so they did. It wasn’t the sort of guild heroics that stories were written about, but it was the kind that made a difference.

Hadrian worked until long after the sun had gone down, and would have kept going if Sandra hadn’t insisted he needed a good, long rest or he’d be useless to them tomorrow. Finally, the party ended up at the Blackbird, a guild inn where the drinks were cheap and the rooms were soundproofed.

They ate on a balcony overlooking the bar floor, watching other late-night guild members drink and eat and chat. Faintly cheerful music drifted from a player piano, and a waitress almost as busty as Quinn brought up mugs of ale whenever their ran low.

“Let’s talk,” Sandra said, without looking at her dining companion.

“You waited until Quinn and Tarja went off for ‘quality time’, hmm?” Hadrian asked, glancing over at her.

The room soundproofing wasn’t just to keep the noise of guildmates out of the bedrooms–it was to keep the noise of hot-and-bothered lovebird quiet.

“I figured you wouldn’t mind the discretion,” Sandra confirmed, watching everything and nothing. “So.”

“Let’s talk,” Hadrian agreed. “It’ll be a quick talk. We’re going after the Wizard.”

“You’re not going to do Serendipity any good bound, gagged, empty-headed and full-diapered,” Sandra replied. “The Wizard hit four temples, full of clerics and even paladins, waltzed through them all, and took their strongest champions. We’re strong. We’re getting stronger. But we can’t fight that.”

“That’s crap,” Hadrian snapped, unwilling to accept bad news. “We’ve gone against him before, and we’re twice the party we were then. We’re not going to sit on our asses and let him keep doing this!” Slamming down his tankard on the table, he drew a couple eyes from the lower floor from cautious, jaded warriors ensuring they didn’t have to be ready for a bar fight.

Sandra sipped her own ale and set her tankard down silently. “I didn’t say we’re going to sit on our asses, either.”

“I’m not opposed to the whole stick-around-and-play-butler aid,” Hadrian said, “But we’re just playing catch up. The only way to stop the Wizard is to put him down or at least bring him in, we can’t be cowards.”

She didn’t mind his heat, his anger. She understood where it came from and could accept that Hadrian was only throwing it at her because he couldn’t throw it at its true target. “Let me talk, Hadrian,” she said.

His lips flattened into a line. “Fine. Talk.”

Leaning forward, she watched the bartender, then sent her eyes to the waitress, then an old, gruff dwarf leaning against the piano. “I was thinking while we worked today, why hit where he did? Why four temples, four priests?”

Hadrian didn’t answer right away, before asking in sarcastic tones, “What, can I answer? You said you wanted to talk, skip the hypotheticals.”

“Alright,” Sandra said coolly. “The wizard operates in curses. He’s got powerful spells, sure. You’ve figured out all sorts of ways he twists magic to be kinky and torturous and vastly stronger than it should be, but his bread and butter is curses, objects, constructed things. It’s cursed items that do the most harm–be it mass produced locking pacifiers that can disable a person completely, or bespoke humiliations he invents on a whim. He does curses.”

Hadrian kept his mouth shut, but nodded.

“And what dispels curses better than divine magic?” Sandra let the question hang for a moment, lending it weight. “I don’t think he hit four temples. I think he hit four Clerics. Four of the strongest in the realm. I think he took out the people most suited to challenge him, the people who–if they got together and pooled their might–could bring him to task.”

Sitting back, she took a long sip of her ale. Hadrian eyed her, a little annoyed at the request for silence, but didn’t interrupt.

“We can’t face the wizard directly,” Sandra said, “But we can deal with his traps. We’ve done it before. If he’s not there, actively hampering us, we’ve got the savvy to stay safe, and we know his magic. We can’t win the battle, but we can rescue the people he’s taken, and once they’re free…then they can take their power, find the wizard, and put. Him. Down.”

Hadrian nodded, in silent thought. After Sandra didn’t say much else, he said, “I’m going to talk now.”

Sandra nodded.

“It’s a good speech.”

“Thanks.”

“And a good plan, too, if we can find where the captives are,” Hadrian said. “Find them, spring a rescue. They might be too cursed to move, though, or to fight once they’re free.”

Sandra nodded. “We’ll have to take it one step at a time. Finding their location will take some doing, releasing their curses will be a long term effort, but we’ve got some powerful allies in our corner. The guild isn’t going to stand for an attack like this, and if they pool all their resources into defense, we can fight off the wizard while we get the priests cured. Plus, if we locate the captives, and free them, that’ll include Janet.”

Hadrian blinked for a moment. “Serendipity.”

“Her given name’s Janet.” Sandra smirked. “I never understood, why do you call her by her performing name? You two seem closer than that.”

“It’s…complicated,” Hadrian conceded, face turning pink. “It’s almost that we’re too close, but it just doesn’t feel quite right calling her… er… mist–”

The front door of the tavern opened, and Sandra held up a hand. “Hold that thought.”

Hadrian had to double take to see what was unusual. The door had opened, but nobody had walked inside. A floorboard creaked, barely audible above the sound of chatter, but a few others noticed.

This was a guild bar, after all. Everyone their had been taught in the school of ambush paranoia, and those lessons carried daggers along with failing grades.

After a moment, though, a figure, no taller than a foot off the ground, padded inside, tongue lolling out adorably. It was a puppy, and a particularly cute one at that. The coloration and pointed ears made Sandra thing, ‘Fox pup,’ though it didn’t quite match–foxes didn’t have cute, colorful eyes, and they didn’t pant like dogs.

Rather, this creature looked as though someone had mashed together the cutest elements of both–fox, puppy, and maybe just a touch of cat in there too. Even from forty feet up, Sandra wanted to pick the little creature up and snuggle it.

It seemed the rest of the bar agreed. After the pup gave a happy little, “Arf,” the entire room responded with a chorus of D’awwws.

“Danger,” Hadrian said.

“Agreed,” Sandra replied, standing up. Scooting back a couple steps, she kept her gaze over the balcony while sending a few hard knocks on Quinn and Tarja’s door. “Sorry to interrupt!”

She could just barely hear their responses, frustrated grumbling by the tone, but they’d come through. She trusted them.

Walking forward, Sandra inspected the creature for magic, and saw the faint spell aura wafting off it. “Mental magic.”

“We’re out of its aura, right?” Hadrian asked, preparing spell reagents from his belt pack.

“I think so,” Sandra said, conjuring black knives in each hand. “Take it out fast, before it can do anything else?”

“Buffs first,” Hadrian suggested. “It’s not actively attacking right now. Let’s wait a second, be sure we’re ready to fight before the music starts.”

Sandra smirked.

Hadrian glanced at her. “What?”

Gesturing with her chin towards the player piano, Sandra said, “The music’s already going. Hit me.”

Hadrian twisted a bit of licorice root between his fingers and Sandra felt the speed surge in her, followed by a secondary surge of precision as he sent a second spell her way. She felt ready to fight, to fly, to take on the world, filled with energy and a buzz that made her want to move.

A second later, the windows of the tavern all exploded inward in unison, and the door flew inward as though kicked by an invisible boot.

The people in the bar reacted, but their foes couldn’t be seen, and they seemed unable to attack, only to throw up defenses and try to prepare to face an invisible enemy that surrounded them on every side.

Sandra couldn’t spot any magic at play, at least not from the windows, though magical shields and wards started going up almost at once, and the fox creature in the center still yipped and cheered happily, sending out some mental effect or another. Hesitating, she tried to resist the urge to leap into battle.

Tarja and Quinn stumbled out of the door, Quinn hastily donning his battle dress while Tarja struggled to stay upright in the doorway, clad in only the cursed onesie she couldn’t remove and a puffy diaper crinkling beneath the crotch snaps.

Quinn’s battle armor was something to behold–a large pink dress made almost entirely of silk and lace, it seemed to always poof out and flounce around him with very movement, and yet it turned away attacks better than any armor they could afford. He wasn’t cursed to wear it, per say, but it was hard to turn down the benefits of protection when a misplaced attack could cost his life, while a floofy pink princess dress only cost a bit of dignity.

Tarja, on the other hand, got neither. Though she held onto her bow with a death grip, it was clear from how she trembled that her curse was in full swing.

“Tarja,” Sandra said, eyeing the chaos below nervously. “You’re going to need to–”

“I know,” Tarja shot back, flushing. “It’s–kinda hawd wi’ now.”

“Make it work, we’re on a time crunch here,” Sandra insisted, fidgeting, feeling a buzz like adrenaline and caffeine and something harder all driving her to move. Maybe Hadrian had sent out the buffs too quickly, but she wanted nothing more than to dive into battle, to get attacking, to run a marathon–

Below, invisible forces were throwing around the guild adventurers, twisting wrists and kicking out legs. Sandra danced from toe to toe, battling her good sense–she wanted to get in, to start fighting, but she was waiting on her party and on a good plan.

“There’s nothing there,” Hadrian said, “But I’m not seeing magic.”

“Me either,” Sandra said. “So…not a spell, not an illusion.”

“Crap, crap, I know this,” Hadrian said, tapping the side of his head in thought.

“Tarja!” Sandra repeated, glancing back at their trembling ranger, whose face was screwed up in concentration. “Any time now would be good.”

“I can’t–” Tarja said.

“You can’t make yourself pee at all?”

Sandra looked back at her, trying not to be annoyed. The curse was a cruel one–Tarja could only have control of her body if she wet her diaper, but it didn’t take much wetting to make it happen. Surely she could pee, just a little, and–

“It’s hard when–” Blush deepening, Tarja said, “It’s hard ta’ pee when I’m…er…”

(Ooooh.) Sandra blushed sympathetically. She and Quinn had been interrupted right in the middle of fooling around, and Tarja’s curses hadn’t been limited to clothes. In possibly the wizard’s cruelest trap, he’d set something up that rearranged Tarja’s nether regions, a transformation that she hadn’t been able to undo since.

And that was the trouble–she was trying to pee with an erection. Now that it’d been pointed out, Sandra couldn’t help but notice the slight tent bulging beneath her onesie.

“Just–” Sandra tried to think of an idea, “Try to think not-sexy thoughts!”

“Yannow how hard it i’ to twy not to fink about somethin’?” Tarja snapped back, her blush rising a note.

“What’re you–” Hadrian started, before piecing it together himself. “Oooh–don’t try to think ‘not sexy’, try to think ‘gross’.”

“I don’–” Tarja said, “Ugh, I dunno, I–”

A crash, and a yell, and Sandra’s heart almost stopped–from nowhere, a gag appeared, a pacifier on a leather strap, and locked itself around the mouth of the waitress. Instantly, her eyes rolled back in her head, she stopped struggling, and a dark yellow stain grew on her dress.

Then she fell to the ground, no longer a concern. They had no time.

“Tarja,” Sandra commanded, tail swishing anxiously, “Gross yourself out, now, we need to fight!”

“I, I–” Tarja stammered, her face totally awash with red, before nodding. “Okay.”

Squatting down, Tarja held onto Quinn’s hand for support so she didn’t fall over completely, screwed up her face, and–

“Mmm, okay,” Sandra mumbled to herself, looking away to give her friend a modicum of privacy. Her acutely pointed ears couldn’t help but hear Tarja’s slight grunts of effort, but there was nothing to be done there.

And, a second later, Sandra heard an accompanying hiss, and then Tarja stood, steady and balanced, bow drawn.

“I’m ready,” she said, nocking an arrow and stepping up next to Sandra. Neither of them said a word about what’d helped her get ready, they just took shallow breaths and pretended nothing was amiss.

Below, the scene was chaos. More gags had appeared, more adventurers were on the ground. Fighters were dropping like flies.

“Let’s go,” Quinn added, holding his massive warhammer at the ready.

“Then–” Sandra started.

“Wait,” Hadrian said, shaking his head and reaching for his component pouch. “I’ve got it. These are elementals–Invisible Stalkers, or something close to them.”

“You have something for that?” Sandra asked, itching to go, ready to scream if there were any more holdups.

He grinned and nodded, producing a little pinch of baby powder. “I do. Let’s see how this works when it’s heightened.”

Raising his hand, he blew, and the baby powder cascaded out of his fingers, turning from a pinch to a torrent, white, fine dust cascading towards the room, outlining everything–including eight invisible bipeds, shuffling, shambling figures.

Sandra couldn’t wait anymore. Grabbing the balcony railing, she leapt over it, daggers out, and plunged into battle, and a second later, her party followed after.

...

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