In the evening, it became apparent just how serious the orcs were about pushing their speed. They kept going, even after the sun had mostly set, marching on in the twilight, only setting up a rudimentary camp just before the light had truly faded. And even then, they mostly split into smaller groups, quickly setting up a small fire to get at least some warm food, but no tents, no fortifications, nothing. We had set up our own camp a little away from the orcs, not bothering to do more than we usually did, especially with the warm nights we had for the last few days. We had just finished eating when Sakgu, who had split from us when we began making camp, returned to ask me to meet with Shaman Firebringer, for a meeting of minds.

I noticed that Sakgu hadn’t used the title of Warleader, but Shaman, making me curious if there was significance to the changed title and stood, planning to go with her. I was a little surprised when Sigmir instantly stood as well, obviously planning to join me, an action quickly mirrored by Adra. That Adra was joining me I could easily understand, she was better when it came to negotiations and social situations in general, but I hadn’t expected Sigmir. I welcomed her, I would always do, but I hadn’t expected her.

With Rai keeping an eye on our small camp, we moved towards the center of the orcish camp, easily finding it thanks to a larger fire and the strong, magical emanations from Dura Firebringer. I noticed that they were a lot more subdued than they had been during the day, less radiant and hot, but still present. Part of me was curious if I would be able to take her, especially with the moon that I could feel somewhere overhead, but I was fully aware that it would be folly to try, win or lose there was nothing to gain from it.

Dura herself stood right in front of a large bonfire, her focus on the fire itself. Looking at her now, I was able to notice distinct, magical fluctuations between her and the bonfire. I wasn’t instantly able to understand what she was doing, but she was using the flames as a medium for some sort of magical ritual. Not wanting to disturb, knowing that some of my own workings were rather delicate, I stopped the others, simply waiting for Dura to acknowledge us. At the same time, I closely observed what I was seeing, using Lenore’s sight to get as much information as possible.

Together with Lenore, I was able to get a reasonably good idea of what the shaman was doing, mostly thanks to the fact that Lenore and I were quite familiar with the intended effect of her magic. It was something we had done quite a few times already, with a spell that we had studied in depth from the Grandmother’s Grimoire. Where the Grimoire had a spell called Water Mirror written within, using a calm surface of water to mirror what was happening in a different place, I had repurposed it to allow me to look through the Shadows, connecting one shadow to another, using the connection to peek at what I wanted to know.

Dura was using fire, the flames allowing her to gather information, somehow. I wasn’t certain about the limitations of her method, couldn’t be, not without studying it a lot closer, especially the casting-process, but I had a feeling we would learn more, anyway.

After waiting for maybe five minutes, the emanations between Dura and the bonfire faded, the fire getting quite a bit smaller in the process. When the fire was of similar size to the other fires, Dura turned around to us, her eyes quickly scanning over our group, before focusing on me.

“There you are. The centaurs continue to move on the predicted path, hopefully we will be able to catch them tomorrow, or the day after.” she said, slowly coming closer.

“You said you had information on our foes, what they have been up to in the east. As neither side is able to ascertain the value of the information you have a equitable trade is difficult, so I have the following proposal: You tell me what you know about the Centaurs, as much as possible, and in turn, you will be given rations for four people, enough to last you two weeks, and I will write a recommendation to the Adventurer's Guild, I’m still a member in good standing.” she suggested, pulling a Guild-Card out of a pouch at her waist, an action that felt completely incongruent to the setting, a savage orc-shaman, pulling out what amounted to a business-card. I managed to keep my features placid, not starting to laugh as I wanted inside, while Adra took the Guild-Card, quickly scanning it before handing it back.

“I think that sounds good.” Adra said, giving me a short glance to make sure I wasn’t objecting. Part of me wanted to suggest haggling, mainly because I had read that one should never take the first offer, but at the end of the day, the information we were sharing didn’t cost us a thing, only a little time. And they might give us an opportunity to get into the orc’s good graces, giving us access to quests, allies and trading-partners. In that regard, the immediate benefit of sharing information was almost negligible. With that in mind, I gave her a quick, short nod.

“Telling you everything will take quite a bit, do you want the information to be known to only you or to your command-staff as well?” Adra suggested, to which Dura nodded, obviously pleased.

“I will gather my command-staff. Did you have dinner, do you want some refreshments?” she asked, before giving a quick command to a nearby aide.

“No, thank you.” Adra told her, while my curiosity got the better of me.

“I noticed you used magic to gather information on the centaurs. I possess some abilities to do something similar, likely with different limitations and conditions. Would you share what you learned and I will see if I’m able to learn more, while Adra here tells you and your staff about the events further east?” I asked, getting a raised eyebrow in return.

“Gather information, you say? I think I can tell you some, not like you can use my methods, not without a deep bond to the spirits of Fire and the Sun, something you most certainly don’t have.” she muttered, nodding to herself.

“What I did is relatively simple,” she began to explain, gesturing to the still-burning fire. “Early this morning, when the sun was just coming up, I conjured some spirits, asking them to gather information for me and creating magical shells for them to do so. They have been riding the wind, bathing in the sunlight, all day, following the centaurs from the air and shortly before sun-set they returned to me, telling me what they learned.” she explained, causing me to nod in understanding.

It explained why I had recognised some of the magical emanations, I had done the same once. Only that I had only had the help of Lenore and my own mind to pilot the magical sensors, greatly limiting what I could do with that.

“Curious, that means you are effectively blind during the night?” I asked, getting the impression that the shells she was using were powering themselves with sunlight, something obviously impossible during the night.

“Indeed, but I highly doubt that they will move far. They made camp when dusk just started to set in, the prisoners they took slowing them down.” she answered, causing me to nod in understanding.

“Can you tell me how far and in which direction they are? I will get some more information about their exact numbers, how they set up camp, things like that.” I told her, getting a nod and the requested information in turn.

They were still a few dozen miles ahead of us, not an impossible distance to cross but not one I had used that type of magic over before, not without some way to ascertain my target. The easiest way would be to simply create a sensor here, linking myself and Lenore to it and moving it there but that would take time and make it obvious what we had done.

“Together?” Lenore asked, curious what we would be able to do joined together, now that we both had crossed the second Divide. It wasn’t serious combat-magic but it was an interesting, and likely safe, experiment to start with.

While Adra started telling the Orcs about our exchanges with the Centaurs, starting near the windswept plains, I sat down, my mind welcoming Lenore as we joined our magic together, focusing on a point miles away, using the Astral River to affect the world in that location.

It wasn’t easy, the amount of power we could send through the River greatly limited, but easily enough to create the scrying-sensor and link to it, watching the dark land beneath.

Now, we just had to find the centaur-camp.