From within the Serith Woods came He

An elf as innocuous as can be

Though His eyes saw visions of a different world

One that would bring this one unfurled

To the light, went not He

But the dark, where none see

Of honesty and truth was the way things were

Yet lies and heresy spoke to this saboteur

- Beware the Everlasting Tyrant, Second Stanzas, author unknown

To say that Weldon was happy to hear that Jevi and I had invited him to continue travelling with us was akin to saying that the sun made the day a little bright. It wasn’t wrong, and was also a massive understatement. How one creature was capable of such unbridled positivity was an enigma to me. I suspected that portion of his personality would remain incomprehensible to me for as long as I lived, and perhaps longer considering that I had already died once.

Across from Weldon was Jevi, who was composed like she had been the day before when she had demanded me to make a decision. Only this time her coldness was directed at the boy across from her rather than myself. She may have lost the duel and been bound by her words to allow Weldon to accompany us, but that agreement did nothing to specify the terms of his company, which she was determining right now.

“... in places where sleeping arrangements must be made, you are not allowed to bunk with Amber or myself. Only when either one of us is elsewhere for the night and there is no chance of us returning are you allowed to even suggest such an arrangement. You may only ignore such when we need healing, which again, is expected from you, or we have need of your presence for some other reason...”

Weldon was simply nodding along, seeing nothing wrong with all that. I personally didn’t see why she was so intent of restricting this pure child’s presence. He literally couldn’t imagine doing anything untoward to either of us, or that was my assumption after speaking with him as much as I had. Regardless, Jevi had opened negotiations by stating Weldon’s healing services were the only reason she was allowing his company, and so expected to be in perfect health for as long as he was with us before demanding more and more inane things. She even had him heal the slash across her back before beginning.

Everything would eventually chafe for the naive Chosen boy, but that was his problem.

I, on the other hand, was impatiently and irritatedly waiting for the meal I had paid for to arrive. Unfortunately, we had sat down mere minutes ago, and I knew the service in this place wasn’t all that good.

Did I miss the invisible servers at places like this in Veliki? Yes. Yes, I very much did. They were quick, clean, silent, and absolutely transparent. You could always tell where any floating plates were headed as well. Not to mention that the waiting time was always listed next to the meal on the menu. Not having that made me more frustrated than it maybe should have.

Now, however, I was seated in a corner booth of the Frog Well with Jevi to my side, one of her feet hooked around my ankle, and boxed in by the presence of Arcus on my other side. I thought demeaning things about the blade thanks to its connection to the Heavens, and therefore it was smaller than it actually was within the bounds of my mind. Having to tolerate its presence, I had to admit it was a truly large weapon.

The large white gem embedded in its hilt was what attracted my attention most though. It was a cloudy white, ever so subtly grey, and now that I was observing it from up close I could see countless points of a more silvery kind of white within the slowly shifting colour. The sight was like the night sky, but white on white instead of white on black. It was the width of my clenched fist and a half, was visible on both sides of the hilt, and looked to have a smooth surface, but one clear of any reflection.

I think it was boredom that made me rest a hand on the scabbard and start pushing magic in. Not aggressively, but also not politely.

Again, I was irritated, impatient, and bored.

That last one was dispelled when my magic was thrust back at me and a familiar female voice sounded in my mind without any sound gracing my ears. “For what purpose do you intrude on my domain, Amber Jewel?” It was every bit imperious as I remembered.

I frowned, still not liking how she had done that with my name. And I didn’t much appreciate the reminder either.

“Do you still regret being marked so by the Heavens?” Lavina continued as if she could read my thoughts, though my displeasure was very clearly telegraphed. “Foolish child. I granted you a boon beyond what was required of me, and not only was it a taxing act, I was scorned because of it. Be glad I can no longer contact my kin and have them demand contrition from you. Some live decades of servitude to merely be offered a chance at attaining what you now possess. It is the least of efforts to be grateful for such a thing.”

Clearly she wasn’t directly involved in my situation with Avien, then. Else she’d be demanding I be grateful for a lot more than that. I wondered at how I might ask a question privately, as what she had said to me had been delivered directly to my mind. Jevi and Weldon were negotiating the split of any loot, and Weldon had finally started arguing when offered a mere five percent of anything found.

What does your stupid mark even do? I demanded from within my thoughts, but there was no response.

That meant I needed to do something else to communicate since speaking out loud meant Jevi might include me in her negotiations. Lacking anything better to do, I recalled the magic in my sword and spread it throughout my body without letting it return to its resting place in my soul. Then I waited for whatever Lavina was going to say next.

“Why have you made contact, child?” She demanded, though her words were muffled, as though she was speaking from two rooms over. Her next words were confused. “What are you attempting?”

What I had succeeded in doing was figuring out how Lavina was delivering her words to me. Tiny streams of magic carried intent through where I was making contact with her directly to my core. They passed through my heart, then split up in seemingly random directions, but shortly made sense in the form of the words I’d been listening to.

What I was now attempting was replicating the effect. The issue was that the magic I used for rezan wouldn’t be effective, as that stuff was damaging in nature, and likely why my magic was pushed back into me. I laid my other hand on the hilt of my dagger and started making it magical again as I simultaneously started weaving less hostile strands of magic from within myself.

They weren’t anywhere near as fine as the magic which had invaded me, but they had no sharp edge like the magic of rezan did. Into one stream of magic, I placed a question, and watched it transform, stretch, and ultimately dissipate. Into another, I placed an impression. As if I was saying ‘question mark’ without the use of words. This time the stream destabilised, but not to the point it dissolved. Compared to Lavina’s telepathic streams, my own were huge and clumsy, but I used them regardless.

I fed the magic to where the scabbard was against my hand. Then, with difficulty I hadn’t experienced since my first forays into my only magical skill, forced the magic to leave my body. The stream connected me to the scabbard, which was a new experience, then crossed over to the sword itself.

Blades clashed and I was overwhelmed with pain for an instant. My hand flinched away, and the vigilant presence of Lavina, colder in the sword than what I remembered, faded in that same moment. Once I was calm enough to take stock, I became aware of an emptiness inside.

All my limbs were still attached, and everything moved as it was meant to, but something was missing. I couldn’t tell what or where it was supposed to even be, leading me to believe I had lost a part of my soul. Jevi gave me a look that I ignored as I placed my hand once more on the scabbard of Arcus.

“Do not attempt such foolhardy actions again.” Lavina told me severely. “You are ill prepared for the consequences. Leave me to my thoughts. I have much to ponder.”

I huffed and did exactly that, thinking unkind things about angels all the while. This new sensation, while not like death, wasn’t pleasant, and I suspected magical healing wouldn’t be doing much for me. That meant all I had to entertain myself with was Jevi’s increasingly outrageous demands.

Breakfast couldn’t come soon enough.

\V/

As it had with my post death episode, time and food went a long way towards making me feel better, and by the time the three of us were along the dock looking to book passage on a ferry I was mostly recovered. Jevi and Weldon were done negotiating for the time being, and surprisingly it was Weldon that was leading the investigation to find the ship we’d be sailing on.

It was a form of travel I was still trying to wrap my head around. Apparently, several wide rivers carved through the Kreg’uune countryside, and when a person wanted to travel from one side of the country to the other, they would travel aboard ship instead of just walking to their destination.

The knowledge clashed with what I knew because I knew horses existed for the purposes of travel, along with carts and wagons and the like. Airships also existed, but were rare and expensive enough that most couldn’t afford them, even in Veliki. As for plain ships, they should’ve only been floating atop the ocean, not a river, yet there they were. Thoughts such as these were what preoccupied my mind. Personally, I think Jevi’s reason for not knowing what to do to book passage was more embarrassing.

“I never did it.” She said, back straight and posture dignified as brushed against me every other step. “Every time I went from one duchy to another it was others who would organise tickets and luggage. Actually, I often had completely different wardrobes for each city, so there were times when there was no luggage.”

“I will guess that you even had a personal boat.” I said blandly, looking out the dock. I could count seven ships being either loaded or unloaded, or moving up or down the river next to Source.

“Ship.” Jevi corrected reflexively. “Or a ferry, at least for these waters. But we did have a ship suited for the ocean as well.”

I frowned, focusing on the term to remember it for later use. We were looking for a ship, not a boat. What was the difference? It hadn’t come up when I was in the School of Paper. “Why would you have both?”

“For travel within Kreg’uune for one. For diplomatic missions to Viceron in the event they were stable enough to even accept a guest such as myself for another. Or to parlay with the many civilisations living within the Volten Ocean.” Jevi paused. “Mind, I’ve not made most of those journeys myself.”

“Our mysterious quest has been delayed!” Weldon suddenly shouted from far too close to my left.

I blinked slowly, returning order to my mind. When did he even get that close? “And why is that, Weldon?”

“I asked when the soonest ferry east is to depart and was told that few ferries travel that way! One departed earlier today, but none carrying living cargo are chartered until tomorrow!”

I winced and tried to gesture Weldon to keep his voice down, but floundered at what exactly gestured that. He stared at me and I had no idea if my request made it through or not.

“It’s because the trade isn’t there. The tension has people scared.” Jevi said, pondering Weldon’s words. “If merchants are already avoiding the east, then it’s only a matter of days until rebellion is declared.”

That made me frown. “I was under the impression that merchants would do everything to profit from this kind of thing.”

“You aren’t wrong, but a breakdown of the supply line Kreg’uune has relied on for three centuries is different from conquering another tract of land along the border. It has everything to do with those supplies the merchants aren’t transporting anymore.”

Jevi took my silence as a prompt to continue. “Juvel provides the jewels and Cavaan provides the metals. In the past, the two would be traded, and the craftsmen in Juvel would make iron into steel, and forge it into weapons of unmatched quality. Some of the swords would be sold back to Cavaan, returning the wealth to Juvel, while the rest of the weapons would supply the soldiers of Silver’s Reach and would be used to conquer new lands, thus securing new sources of wealth.”

That didn’t quite make sense. “What about Source, then? There are mines here.”

Jevi smiled and shook her head, tutting. Evidently she expected me to say that. “There are mines here, true. But the volume of the ore, and most importantly the quality of it, can’t match the numerous mines piercing the ground beneath Cavaan.”

“So what? The duchy of Cavaan is holding the swords of the kingdom hostage by cutting the supply at the source? Not Source, but- gah. You know what I mean. Tell me it’s more complicated because I can think of several reasons why that wouldn’t work.”

“Look at you, thinking with your head.” Jevi said, just a touch condescending. I gave her a new slash through one of her eyebrows, fast enough that my dagger returned to its scabbard with no passerbys noticing me doing anything. “That was how it was hundreds of years ago. Time passed and things changed. Blacksmiths got tired of requesting ores through missives and moved east to be closer to the mines. There are still those that smith in Juvel, but they mostly cater to nobility, crafting jewelry and such...”

A ghost of a grimace passed over her face. “Now that I think about it... It’s very possible that the swords have been taken hostage. I’d need to check with… someone I can’t speak to anymore.”

I arched an eyebrow. “That doesn’t explain how the king can’t just march an army over to Cavaan and force them to obey him again.”

“Tha- The king- gah.” Jevi stumbled over her words, then swallowed. She looked genuinely distressed. “Amber, you said one sentence that I don’t recall hearing once in the past five years of ratcheting tension in the circles I no longer have access to. I may only be fifteen, but my status saw me sitting in on meetings on such topics. The cause behind the tension was always thought to be the stranglehold of wealth on behalf of the crown. It was believed to be desperation. What you said painted a different picture within my mind, one of their confidence, and now I can’t shake it.”

”Wait.” I looked at her again. Like she had the first time I saw her, Jevi looked to be at least a year or two older than me as best I could tell. “How are you fifteen?”

“My ten and fifth birthday was near on a season ago.” She said, not quite focusing on her answer to the question. I squinted hard at her, then shrugged. It wasn’t as if I had a good frame of reference for kids older than me. Every time I placed someone’s age it was a lucky guess at best.

But it was obvious the painting in Jevi’s head was preoccupying her thoughts. “So?” I demanded. “What is it?”

“A form of insurrection years in the making.” Jevi said gravely. “Cavaan has all the weapon smiths. There are others, but most of them reside within the hollow city itself. It just struck me as entirely possible that they equipped the king’s royal armies with merely good quality weapons and hoarded the rest for themselves. The swords and spears in the armories across the country? Subpar quality, at least compared to what I’m used to. A fact obfuscated by quartermasters with divided loyalties. When the rebellion begins, all maintenance will evaporate overnight, and the equipment of the soldiers will quickly degrade as consequence.

“The armies of Silver’s Reach would have a limited time to invade the country it’s supposed to protect, or all chapters of the army would start to buckle. Not to mention they will be attacking a fortified position. The effects would reach farther than a simple civil war. Without equipped soldiers to stop them, the elves of the Woods would start planting their trees once more and we would not be able to stop them. The barbarians in the south would spread their blasted sands unchecked. Even the Noarchac might finally win the battle for the Bloody fucking Hallway!”

I didn’t think it would be as bad as she was making it out to be. For one, Cavaan was almost as far east as Kreg’uune went, meaning that the Bloody Hallway would be their problem. As for the elves and Eiar, I couldn’t argue.

“That reminds me of the Crusade of Steel and Tears.” Weldon commented.

“Never heard of it.” I told him, getting a helpless shrug. It made me frown, that he had heard of something I had not. He didn’t have an education sourced from the Accursed Atheneum, which had history stretching back much farther than any other library. Likely it was something only relevant to the Heavens, or he had made it up. Regardless, Jevi seemed to be taking this much more seriously than I thought she might. The girl wore a haunted frown, and her eyes were flicking about quickly, but seeing nothing.

I put my hand on her forehead, and my palm came away wet with sweat. Suppressing a sigh, I wiped the frustrated expression from my face and slapped the girl lightly with both hands to make her look at me. “Jevi, there is nothing stopping you from scribing a message and sending it to your former acquaintances. We’ll travel under an alias so they don’t track you from here if they are so inclined.”

“...” Jevi heaved out a sigh, calming down. “You are right, Amber.” She took my hand and used it to pull me into a quick hug, releasing me before I could announce my protests. “I’ll… be using today to that end, then. I hope it’s not too late.”

“Not yet.” I announced, tugging her hand back when she tried to leave. Somehow, I actually stopped her. That was likely from the moment of power- or significance that I simply couldn’t figure the reason behind. Nevertheless… “We are here to book passage east, and your incessant haggling is required.”

The look Jevi gave me was complicated to say the least. I saw it as mostly positive emotion, but Jevi was good at concealing her true feelings. She rubbed the back of her neck with embarrassment. “Ah. I forgot.”

I looked to Weldon. “Where is the harbourmaster, that we may find a captain to book passage with?”

Weldon grinned, and regaled us with many a compliment to a certain man’s value of character. Unfortunately, it was rather pointless as we spent less than a full minute speaking with that man before being directed to a ship under repair the next dock over. Even so, I shall remember the fact that the harbourmaster literally had one eye larger than the other for some time. The image is one difficult to banish from my mind, though the man’s character was actually quite pleasant, if brusk.

The Busty Butler was a strange sight to behold. It’s figurehead, true to the vessel’s title, was of a wooden carved butler who was verifiably busty. More so than either me or Jevi, and few were able to claim as such. He held forward a wooden plate that I could not see the contents of, and his clothes were painted on, though the legs melded into the thick beam of wood running down the centre of the exterior. I could not tell whether I should be impressed or embarrassed, and settled on incredibly confused.

As for the captain of said vessel, he was a gangly man, too-tall and with striking green hair visible under his trifold hat. He instantly struck me as a pirate type, which made no sense considering that this was a lawful zone. Pirates sailed the seas of the Volten Ocean far from inland areas such as these, or that was how things were supposed to be.

More importantly, no one else around had such a vibrant colour for their hair save Weldon, but his was simply naturally bleached. His voice didn’t quite match the body it came from, ringing out deep across the dock despite the fact that I could not spy an adam’s apple on his neck.

What unsettled me was that no one commented on his strange features. In fact, it seemed that none other than me saw anything wrong with his appearance. Then I noticed lines of vaguely familiar text running along all his limbs and up the sides of his neck. They were mostly concealed by his clothes, and were all tattooed in a pale and shimmering sky like blue that was difficult to notice at first. The point was, that’s when I started panicking.

Weldon was the one to introduce us. “Captain Sanjak! We three brave adventurers, two of whom are fair maidens of esteemed background, require to book passage on your ferry, this Busty Butler!”

We were still over fifteen metres away and surrounded by other dockworkers. I massaged the bridge of my nose in an attempt to calm down. That could’ve been said at a more reasonable volume from a reasonable speaking distance.

“Ah, and I suppose you are the fair maiden then?” Captain Sanjak grinned, his clean, toothy smile not matching those I’d seen around in the past several minutes. All his teeth were still there. “Ha! I jest!” He turned serious. “Passage will be costly…” He looked us over.

Jevi stepped forward, ready to haggle.

“Jvina! Set these three up with tickets as far as Burden Bridge!” Sanjak shouted back at his ship.

“Aye, Cap’n!” Came back from the deck of the ship, though I couldn’t see the speaker.

“Waive the fee, matey!”

“Aye, Cap’n!”

Sanjak turned his smile back on us, now missing a tooth under his nose. “We leave tomorrow, two hours after sunrise. Some like to beat the rush, but me? I like to take a nap and wait it out. See you landlubbers then!” He waved brightly at us and turned away, striding towards his ship.

There was a hole in the side that, once Sanjak passed by, was now miraculously fixed.

“Oh no.” I said.

“Oh no?” Jevi asked, turning back to me with a huge grin on her face. “What are you talking about, we just made a great deal! Passage for free!”

“Do you have any idea what just happened?” I demanded.

“No, I do not!” Weldon declared. “But arrogance is not a sin!”

“Except when you sin without knowing it.” I deadpanned.

Weldon nodded as if I had just revealed the secrets of the world. “I could not have said it better myself.”

I pressed my knuckles into my eyes, suddenly tired. Jevi rubbed my shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. Let’s go get our tickets before Captain Sanjak changes his mind.”

I didn’t want to. I really, really didn’t want to get close to this kind of chaos magic. Ratmaker had been enough for me, and Bubbles before him. I didn’t want to willingly spend time around that type of character, and therefore didn’t want to go get this ticket that would deliver me closer to my eventual destination.

But I did.

\V/