We arrived after the long day of travel, and perhaps one day wasn't so bad considering how slow the carriage was.

Unfortunately, where we arrived wasn't the capital, but in Ibbergreen, that very village Nistan had wanted to whisk me off to.

We didn't stay long in the village. The sky had darkened and mother had pulled the shutters and curtains of the carriage closed. She told me the people here weren't friendly, and that even at the tower, were weren't safe here.

“Make sure you stay by my side, do you hear?” She whispered, squeezing my hand. “If anything happens to you, shout for me, alright?”

I nodded and shivered, even though I was warm in her arms.

The carriage kept bumping around until I heard voices outside of the carriage that was slowing to a halt.

"Lord Scafel, thank you again for your offer of rest during our travels.”

That was father.

"Not at all, it is rare to have visitors, Lord Feles, and a small pleasure of mine to show the chateau to my most esteemed neighbour."

After mother simply unlatched the lock, Sir Barker started opening up the door and curtains from the outside for us.

My father was talking to a gentleman in a purple velvet vest, who had come outside to greet us. The man looked twice father's age, slim though not fit and spoke in a peculiarly high-pitched voice, reminding me somewhat of shaman Ikstoff.

"Yertrand, come around and take their man and horses to the stables," he told a boy, not all that much older than Pricel who seemed to be the stable boy.

The chateau as its lord called it, was fitting of the noun. Unlike our manor in Olwick, this one was a tower, thick and shaped, not circular, but a tower all the same.

I forgot my fear from mother's words and the nighttime carriage trip as the lord guided all of us up through a tiny stone spiral staircase. I almost giggled as father in front of us had to bend his head to avoid hitting the bottom of the stairs above.

"Excuse the small stairwell, the chateau dates back to soon after the founding. Although it saddens me that the Scafels were not always the lords of Ibbergreen, my great-great-great-grandfather, one Paike Scafel got Ibbergreen did come by this honour after he served valiantly under Verston Mershunt I in defeating the arrogant Keiranians."

I was already feeling sick to my stomach from the carriage ride and this man's apparent obsessions with his family history were making me feel even worse. At least he didn't seem dangerous.

"It is a point of great pride for me to have one of the longest lineages in Efeles. After yours of course. None match the sijon's line."

I yawned as he kept my travel weary parents from sitting, insisting on showing them paintings and portraits and other curio he seems to have collected in his living place. It seemed we didn't have much say in the conversation, despite being guests and family of that great sijon.

More than once as he was speaking, I saw him glance at me, but, oddly, he didn't seem to be looking so much at me as my mother's chest. I looked too, but it wasn't as if she was wearing the jewelled brooch she sometimes did.

Eventually we did sit, in somewhat austere chairs with cushions piled on top. Despite the impressive facade of the chateau, the chairs and draught made Lord Scafel's boasting feel hollow.

In fact, his breezy tower was a rather nice, if musty reprieve from the heat outside, but his pretentious prattle made it impossible to think of anything but Ivian all alone in the Olwick manor.

"Let Urga take the baby to another room while we sit down to our repast," the lord of Ibbergreen dismissed me with a wave of his arm. “Urga!” He shouted and I flinched at the hidden anger in his tone, “take the babe somewhere to eat.”

A very wide woman with a permanent scowl stepped forward from the edge of the room. To my great relief, instead of following the lord's wishes, mother responded to Lord Scafel that she was feeling somewhat ill after the long carriage ride and had to excuse herself from the surely wonderful banquet that our host had prepared.

"I am afraid I am not feeling all that well after the carriage, Lord Scafel. I will see my son to sleep and get a breath of fresh air before retiring to bed myself." My mother suggested to my relief instead.

Soon we were following Urga down the narrow staircase that I was astounded she could fit through.

"Urga, do you know where our coachman is?"

"Uh, the old man who came with you?" Urga said while wringing her hands, "Wouldn't he be out at the stables?"

"Lead us to the stables please," my mother said curtly.

"Alright, milady."

The stable that Urga led us to wasn't attached to the tower. We had to walk through a thicket of trees in the dying light of the sun.

It was not hot in the evening, but I still clung to the warmth on mother's shoulder as the change in temperature gave me a chill. I slipped my toes into the elusive fold in mother's clothing where they fell near her waist. I had grown a lot since I was injured by Nistan.

Before we could even see the building, I could smell the horses.

Fafi announced her approach tail wagging side to side as he came to walk with us.

She looked like she wanted to bark, twitching left and right every so often, but Fafi had something clenched in their mouth that she didn't want to drop. The hair of her muzzle, particularly under their nose and mouth was all red, and by the bone sticking out of the thing, it seemed Fafi was ripping through a leg or arm of some furry animal.

The stable was a rickety wooden thing, pretty much identical to the one back home. The boy, Yertrand, that we saw when we arrived was inside.

I was shocked as I saw him stick a metal hook into the foot of one of our horses. I looked sharply at mother but she didn't seem alarmed.

"The stable boy is just cleaning out the horse's hoof." Mother told me with a smile. "We all had a long day and we don't want her to get bruised."

Horses get bruised? Wouldn't jabbing a metal hook into her foot bruise her then? No matter, mother says it's fine.

"Yertrand, do you know where their coachman went?" Urga asked the boy.

"Urga?" Yertrand looked up from the hoof. There was a tinge of fear in his crouched shoulders as he looked first at Urga and then at us.

"Mr. Barker!" the stable boy then shouted and we heard some clatter in the back.

"Good evening Mr. Barker," mother greeted him. "Tilly and I will be going to our chambers now. Do you think you could bring in my chest in now?"

"Of course, milady."

We walked back to the tower, now with Mr. Barker and Urga each carrying one side of the chest that was on the back of the carriage. The first few stars were appearing and I wondered, not for the first time, what they were, and why I didn't seem to have any recollections of stars.

Urga told us to wait outside as they took the chest up, but mother insisted we go ahead of them.

The chest kept clunking on the walls. It looked very awkward bringing it up through the narrow spiral. Mr. Barker below seemed to be holding most of the weight, but it was Urga who asked to put it down at the first floor.

We went up three floors before Urga showed us into a small room where they lay the chest down in a corner.

"Urga, once you catch your breath, please go get Tilvrade's meal. Mr. Barker, please stay a moment, I could use your help."

Mr. Barker who had been about to leave turned around.

"Right, milady."

Once Urga was gone, I felt mother's smile disappear, as she bobbed me up and down nervously.

"Look at this place. He fools himself into thinking he is an aristocrat despite his slovenly lifestyle."

"Milady," Mr. Barker said quietly, "it's not right for a coachman to be in the quarters. What did you need me for?"

"Sorry Jom. That man and this place put me on edge. He had the nerve to talk about his lineage when he knows full well I'm from a new noble family." Mother seemed quite distressed by the lord's earlier prattle.

Maybe there was a hidden conversation going on behind what I could understand.

"I just want you close by, at least until my husband returns. This is where that mesmer said he would take my son. I told Sivis this was a bad idea. He just told me I was overthinking. Can you believe that the man told me to just hand Tilly over to his maid?"

My mother was definitely offput.

"Yes, milady. I shall stand just outside the room then." Mr. Barker responded and made his way out.

Despite my mother's concerns, or perhaps thanks to them and Mr. Barker standing guard, nothing went wrong over the course of the evening.

She did, however, ask Mr. Barker to eat a spoonful of the barley soup with meat and carrots that the maid left at our door and waited until it was cold before she fed the rest to me.

I focused on my daily mana accumulation feeling that tingly chill rest in my abdomen before sleep took me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I knew I was dreaming when I saw the dark spire.

It was unlike the tower in Ibbergreen, its edges twisting around like a screw. Each lap the spiral ran, it overlapped the edge above, obscuring any core from view.

At first, I thought it was far in the distance. It was small, but so very detailed, even the little drops of darkness circling around its peak like birds circling their nesting grounds.

But it wasn't far, just small. Or perhaps it was me who was big here, even though I was still a baby. I had thought it far because I was lying on the ground, the spire right in front of me.

Well, that was unusual, in my visions and dreams, I was usually different. I never really saw myself, but I was like father, tall and manly. Why was it that this dream was so different?

I gasped as one of the flying black splotches disappeared into my finger where I had reached out to touch it. It tingled with cold and pain, just like the mana I felt in my abdomen.

Mana, but dark, liquid and foreign, holding pain instead of power.

The miasma circling the spike grew thicker as if reacting to the pain it caused me.

I turned to run, concerned that I could feel such clear pain in a dream. But all there was in front of me was the precipice falling into the red clouds, the sky encircling me in all directions.

I panicked, but in my search for escape, one of the clouds opened, rays of white light piercing through this world.

As the light hit me, I disappeared, dissolved into waking darkness.

"Mother?" I called nervously into the dark room.

I felt an unfamiliar cushion beneath me, and didn't realise for a moment where I was.

I could hear mother's breathing in the room falter.

"Tilly?" A sleepy whisper responded to me.

Then mother's arms were around me, her warmth dispelling the scare from the dream before.

She whispered something to father who left the room. Then just pat me on the head and rocked me to and fro until I fell asleep once again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next morning, we all ate in the Lord got Ibbergreen's dining hall.

Both my parents looked rather grumpy and tired.

"Morning ho," the lord gave us a chipper greeting but then, noticing father's frown explained apologetically, "ah, just how we've always said it here, morning ho, haha."

An awkward silence filled the dining hall as Urga and a valet brought some plates from a side door.

"Ahum, well then, long journey ahead for you, Lord Feles, yes? Nothing like a good breakfast before riding."

"Yes, thank you for your hospitality. It makes a journey a lot more pleasant to sleep in a proper bed."

"Yes, quite, yes quite."

Either Lord got Ibbergreen didn't hear father's emphasis or he didn't think it proper to take heed. Instead, he started to talk of father's return to the capital.

"Excellent to hear you are returning to the capital, Lord Feles. You have by far the most legitimate claim."

Father stared quietly for a moment at the lord opposite him before donning a thin smile.

"Your opinions are kind. However, I am going to the capital for my son, not a title."

"Indeed," the lord got Ibbergreen responded knowingly, "It is no less important for your son to inherit the position."

My father didn't respond, though he did maintain his thin smile as he cut another slice of a bacon and put it in his mouth.

Urga brought another bowl of a watery porridge, made of barley. It wasn't very tasty, but mother cut me some of her bacon, so I didn't complain.

Our host prattled on, repeatedly expressing his esteem for my father and for his own noble forebears.

I was rather grateful he didn't express any interest in me through our whole visit, or much in mother either. Much better that he just pestered father.

My parents seemed to be just as eager to leave as I was when we finished eating and Mr. Barker seemed to have anticipated that, as he had the horses saddled and the carriage stopped in front of the tower when we arrived outside.

"Please stop by whenever you return. It is an honour to receive the future Sijon Feles at any time!"

The lord bid us farewell as the horses began to move.