Filia sipped her tea, worried. Xelloss was acting strange. He had actually had his eyes open ever since she had asked him her questions, and he had replied with his own. She didn't answer -- because only answer that came to her mind, and seemed to fit, was that he actually cared about her -- was impossible. Instead she told him about her dreams.

Now, having finally finished, without any interruptions from Xelloss, the kitchen was quiet. Xelloss watched her thoughtfully over the rim of his own teacup, which he had dropped a few cloves into, waiting to speak until Filia was starting to feel like somebody had put itching powder into the crotch of her panties. "So, the red orb that matches the one in my staff was called in your dreams 'the Eyes of Shabraningdo'?"

Filia nodded. "Yes, it was."

Xelloss sighed. "You know how Orihalcon is formed of materials detached from the Flare Dragon while in battle with Lord Ruby Eyes?" Filia nodded, not quite understanding why this was relevant. "Parts of Lord Shabraningdo were also cut away from his body, before he was split into seven parts, his 'blood.' The two largest of these were formed by Phibrizo-sama not long afterwards into a pair of large spheres. These spheres, capable of amplifying a mazoku's power and of letting a mazoku draw upon an outside power without harm, were given the name of 'the Eyes of Shabraningdo' by a human sorcerer.

"There are some smaller pieces of this material out there, but they are, on the whole, not as strong as the Eyes, and it is nowhere near as common as Orihalcon. Most of it resides in the hands of the Dark Lords, though what has happened to Garv's and to Phibrizo-sama's own pieces is unknown to me. The Mazoku know in whose hands almost all of the rest of the known pieces of it are in. Only one known piece is lost."

Filia blinked, as she realized both what that piece was, and what that meant the jewel in Xelloss's staff was... "One of the Eyes..."

Xelloss nodded. "It was stolen just before Phibrizo-sama revived a piece of Shabraningdo. Things had not been that stable, the war had been brewing for quite a while, and so Phibrizo-sama decided to place it in the direct care of the youngest Dark Lord, Zelas-sama..."

Xelloss sat on the floor of the 'reception' room that Zelas maintained for when she was being visited by other Dark Lords. He wasn't sure why Zelas-sama had asked him to be in there, particularly since she hadn't requested him to not seem to be paying any attention to whatever might happen while he was in there. He decided to bring one of the many books Zelas had told him to read with him, and was pretending to be reading it.

Xelloss was a very young mazoku, and was actually the age he looked like. He was also rather inexperienced, having only been off Wolf Pack a few times, and those times with Zelas. The world outside was interesting, though, and Zelas had promised him that she would, when the time was right, let him travel alone. In the meantime, though, he was to stay with her.

This would be the first time he got to be near a Dark Lord other than his own 'mother'. He was looking forward to it.

He felt a large power -- even larger than Zelas's -- arrive, and a man appeared. He was about half a foot shorter than Xelloss, with golden eyes and wild black hair that had been subjected with only partial success to an attempt to pull it back into a very short pony tail. He wore form-fitting blue clothes, which highlighted his muscles, and was carrying a metal box almost half his height. In less than a minute, Xelloss felt the familiar presence of Zelas, and she joined them. "Hello, Hellmaster Phibrizo. I have been expecting you."

"Hello, Zelas. I have brought something for you to guard," he said, getting straight to business.

Xelloss didn't like that: Zelas had always told him, "Anybody who, outside of an emergency, goes straight to business without any kind of small talk is not a good person to work with." No wonder Zelas-sama was not happy to hear that Hellmaster was going to come here...

"You want me to guard something?" she asked, somehow keeping the annoyance Xelloss knew had to be there out of her voice. "Why me, and what is it?"

Phibrizo smiled, a quite sinister smile. "You have a nice isolated island, and this." He shifted the box onto one arm and opened it to reveal two large red jewels nestled in the padding. Xelloss had to work hard to keep from staring as he recognized them as gigantic specimens of the same material which the small beads in Zelas's three-strand choker made from.

Zelas was clearly surprised. "You want me to guard these?"

"Yes," Phibrizo said. "With what is going on in the world, such important items as these need to be in as safe a place as possible, and my stronghold would be the first place that anyone who is searching for these would look. Normally, I would not worry about such things, but I have recently had several uninvited guests..."

"Oh my. Somebody took being told to go to Hell as an order?" Zelas asked, taking the box and closing it.

Phibrizo, either not noticing or simply ignoring the humor, nodded. "I know that your island's location is not known except to those whom you wish to have such information, and that your new servant is said to be one of the most powerful." Phibrizo looked at Xelloss, who immediately buried his nose in his book. He could feel Phibrizo's desire to have him as his own servant and plaything, and didn't like the feeling at all.

"Thine orders are my desire," Zelas said, using the formal phrasing and making Phibrizo have to stop looking so covetously at her servant. "I shall keep these as safe as I am able to."

Phibrizo nodded, acknowledging Zelas's statement. "I have other things to take care of," he said, before leaving.

Zelas made a sound that Xelloss recognized as meaning that she was quite annoyed. "How rude! He didn't even say good bye!"

Xelloss followed after Zelas, the box cradled in his arms. She had not said where they were going, but as she led him along the rocky beach below the cliffs on the southwest shore he had quickly guessed. The caves at the bottom of the cliff were the safest locations on the island outside of directly under his mother's nose.

The beach itself was a narrow shelf, the bottom dropping sharply only a few feet away from its edge when it existed. The rocks of the beach could only be walked at low tide -- and it only existed as a true beach at the lowest of tides -- as the currents would pull any who tried to walk it to a certain death. (Well, not mazoku: a mazoku would simply face certain doom. Xelloss wasn't sure what Zelas kept right off-shore, and he didn't really want to meet it.)

In addition to that, the rocks were sharp and piled chaotically. It would be almost impossible to navigate a boat through them without destroying its hull. Xelloss felt that the odds of such a thing happening were only slightly better than those of Shabraningdo-sama suddenly declaring himself a pacifist and devoting himself towards helping the unfortunate of the world.

Xelloss suspected that, for the extra (though unnecessary in his opinion) security, Zelas was going to have him put it into one of the caves that was normally completely flooded and whose mouth was often underwater. It would be safe: he doubted anybody would even be insane enough to try, no less actually able to succeed.

Zelas stopped in front of one of the cave mouths, this one the lowest he had seen yet. "Xelloss, open the case for me, please. I want to do something before we put it in."

Xelloss knelt down, carefully balancing the box on one knee as he opened it. He managed, barely, to maintain his balance, as the rocks were not flat and the tide was on its way back in so the water tugged at his feet. It would not do for him to drop such valuable things, and it would be just plain embarrassing to fall over in front of Zelas-sama.

Zelas reached in and took out one of the two spheres. "I don't want to keep these two together. I do not want to risk both getting stolen, should thieves somehow manage to come here."

Xelloss closed the box, and carefully stood back up. "But Zelas-sama..."

She smiled kindly at him. "You are still very young, Xelloss," she said, with only fondness in her voice. "You will learn, eventually, to be more cautious about such things." Her expression changed. "However, I do need to punish you for daring to question me. Go place the case with the remaining jewel at the back of this cave."

Xelloss winced. He knew that he should have guessed that was why Zelas had made him come with her, and he knew that Zelas wanted him to become more comfortable with swimming. Still, he couldn't really say no. Resigned, he pushed the case in and then dived in after it, all too aware of his complete lack of grace. The sooner he finished, the better. Perhaps, he thought to himself, if I get it done quickly enough, Zelas would help me pull myself out.

Xelloss placed the box as quickly as he could, then swam back to the entrance, wishing the entire time that the cliff was not so well warded against attempts to simply teleport into or out of its caves. It would be much easier to not have to swim. He'd not have to spend so much time underwater, either, if he could have just used the astral plane to enter and exit it.

Luckily for Xelloss, Zelas was pleased enough with his work to help him. She did, however, grin in amusement. "Good, Xelloss," she said approvingly. "Now, put this in your bag. You will guard it yourself."

Xelloss stared at the red jewel in his hands. "You want me to guard it...?" he said, distractedly obeying Zelas's instructions. He had not expected her to give him such an important job so soon.

"Yes, Xelloss. You are my most powerful servant," not bothering mentioning that he was almost her only one, "and I think you are ready for this. You will also keep an eye on the other one. I expect you to make sure that no thieves come even close to either the one you carry yourself or the one in the cave."

Xelloss knelt in a low bow as well as he could without falling into the water, which was now thigh-deep. "As thou command, my lord," he said, feeling that formal phrasing suited the occasion. "I shall obey."

Zelas grinned. "See that you do, Xelloss."