CHAPTER 27

I had missed morning mess thanks to the girls’ hearty ministrations to my lack of martial skill. Even with my Advanced Flow there was just no way for me to adjust to the weight as it was on me with the items I had been loaned.

Bruth had kicked me so hard I’d had to say the command word just to stand up and then she went right into me again and did the same. It was all I could do to defend myself, let alone dodge and counter. That just seemed to spur her on even harder.

The added weight made my limbs awkward and strained my muscles quickly, but the girls were truly excited that I was taking my training seriously. So I decided to wear the items at all times to grow accustomed to the weight and only take them off to bathe and when ordered to, though I would wear the vest under my uniform so that it drew less attention if at all possible.

Those girls are sadists…I mentally whined once more, though I was grateful for the assistance, it had occurred to me that I could run away at any time and they would likely capture me and drag me back.

The only bright spot of it all having been that every time one of them told me to defend myself or do something, I was collecting small amounts of experience from Kalia. The morning’s exercise had put me about a tenth of the way to my next level alone.

I came back to my room limping and dragging my feet, only minutely aware that I wasn’t alone in the hallway. I looked up and saw Xanile standing with Winfred, the woman carrying a small covered tray.

“You look like something the mirror cat dragged in.” Winfred chuckled to herself. “Taller to boot, are you okay?”

I nodded, the bone-deep fatigue getting to me. My stomach growled noisily and all I wanted was to bathe and nap and eat.

“Are you still willing to come into the forest with me today?” I could have sobbed at her timing, but I nodded. She sniffed the air and gagged, “Take a bath first! You reek, and the beasts will smell you coming leagues away, Saemus.”

She nodded to Winfred who just snorted to herself and joined me in going into my room. She gasped at the plants that were there, “You grew these?” I nodded as she set the covered tray on my desk and ventured closer to the ivy near my bed. “They’re beautiful.”

“I would grow more if I had the pots to use for them.” I grimaced as the smell of food drifted closer to me and my stomach growled angrily.

She turned toward me as I piled all of my clothes and boots together and put them into a pile by the chute. “Do you think you could grow something with the seeds alone?” I nodded. “I’ll get you all of the pots, urns and vases whatever you need. I’ll come a day or two from now so you can rest.”

“What is it?” I stared at her and she just sighed wistfully and shook her head, motioning to the food.

“Eat, and then bathe.” She smiled and lifted her chin to sniff for something, “And you’ll be wanting to eat those sweets too. They’ll be bad soon.”

I blinked, surprised I hadn’t remembered them myself and dug into my desk to find them as she left the room. They were a little crunchier than they had looked, but went down swiftly and deliciously. The food on the tray was simple, but may as well have been fit for a king or a starving beggar for how swiftly I wolfed it down.

Mother would have been appalled.

I bathed quickly after putting the clothes in the chute and leaving them a note requesting larger clothes, and feeling revitalized for having eaten, muttered to Frix, “Hey, can you talk to Kalia and have her make it so that my luck is only used if my life is in danger?” I paused then added, “Or if the injury will result in being so seriously maimed that no one here can fix me?”

The book on the desk shook a bit as he scrawled a simple, I will. Though if I were you, I would start hoarding it if you mean to make unsound decisions. That fight with the moss lion could have gone so much worse than it did. You were incredibly lucky, I’m surprised you have any left at all. Also, you’ll want to perform some maintenance on your shunas’ cores. Would you like me to walk you through it now?

“Yes please.”

He had me sit at the desk with the axe shuna on the surface with my hand over it, pooling mana in a small globule under my hand, then slowly funnel it into the small, coin-like insert. A small bar drifted up over it showing me that it was little more than half-way full.

Competency has been gained with a basic skill, Kalia’s voice drifted through my mind and I confirmed it in my status screen. I had gained Basic Core Insight.

“Frix?” Even as my voice left my throat, I could see that he was already writing.

This is monumental! His handwriting was hurried and harder to read than normal. If you get this skill to a certain level, you’ll be able to see which beasts will be carrying a core! Invest in it, and it won’t be luck that you rely on to get them!

I blinked at that and had to fight the urge to pump it all the way to master right away. But then again, I had only two skills and six points that I could use. I stood no chance in a normal fight against most people and against powerful beasts, it was less likely for me to come out on top without sacrificing my luck.

I sighed and did it, taking both to master level and using all the skill points available to me at the moment until I used the levels I had.

Advanced Flow is now Master Flow. Your mastery allows you to attend the flow within you and track it in others more easily. Your sense of the flow will now begin to affect more about you and your abilities.

Basic Core Insight is now Master Core Insight. Your mastery allows you to find cores in others more easily, interact with cores obtained and will lead to other skills eventually that involve beast cores.

Warning! Kalia’s voice sounded panicked as she spoke and continued without prompt, Your understanding of the world is about to be warped by mastery without understanding. You have two minutes to decide on whether you will risk the warp, or spend the necessary statistic points to increase your Mind stat.

Bile rose in my throat, I was being forced to spend these points without meaning to, all because I had thought myself ready to master something like this.

“How may points do I need to avoid this Frix?” I closed my eyes while he conferred with Kalia.

I opened my eyes a few seconds later and his message said, I… I don’t know. She can’t tell me. None of the other Avatar’s have done this before.

“There were more?” I shouted and growled, diving into my status and draining points into my mind stat as the warning kept repeating into my mind with Kalia becoming more and more frantic as she did so. I made it to ten points in the stat before the warning stopped. I crumpled onto my desk, the thudding of my heart hammering against the wood through my ribs.

I glanced up and scowled at the book, “What else are you hiding from me?”

Nothing too much really, other than that I’m a limiter on your power, not just a go between for you and your magic. I blinked at the page, uncomprehending for a moment, but he continued on. This was decided after the last avatar lost control of himself and nearly wiped out all life in the Fae Realm, Saemus. This is not a slight against you. We just needed to…to make sure that you wouldn’t allow the power to go to your head like he did. It’s why the history books are so vague about what happened. Because there were so few survivors that the realm itself had to kill him and replenish itself.

You seem like a good kid. He paused for a moment before his scrawling writing added, I’d hate for that to happen to you.

“Why are you telling me this now?” I asked quietly, fighting back tears of panic and fear. Would I destroy the realm?

The one pulling our strings is currently otherwise occupied and I was so startled that once a little slipped, I knew I wouldn’t be able to just push it aside and have you accept it. So I’m trusting you with your fate for now until you’re old enough or strong enough to control your power on your own.

“What makes you think I’ll ever be any of that?” It was hard not to raise my voice.

Hope that I won’t always be at the beck and call of a sullen, sometimes-abrasive child? I could almost feel him laughing at my shock. But mainly because the realm needs you now more than ever. Get your head out of your butt, and get it in gear. Also, don’t think about this to me again. Our watcher returns soon and anything like this could see you killed, or me taken and replaced by someone who actively hates you and what you are.

I didn’t want that. “You have to discuss this with me again if they’re ever not watching again.” He agreed and I asked solemnly, “Do you really think I’m abrasive?”

He laughed and said, And I’m not the only one. You’re young, and that’s easy for some people to get over because you are. Others take that young mind and abrasive nature and ignore it so that they can use you for your power. And no—you need to learn who they are on your own so you aren’t prone to ignorance in the future if I’m not here.

I vowed to try and curb my anger, but it was hard to remain placid in your prison, even if it was somewhere I had the ability to thrive or beat the people who were making my time here miserable.

I sighed and shut the book, no longer willing to face my own flaws head on and focused on refilling the core in the shuna before me.

The small bar that was in the air above it before had turned into a circular display that had a red portion at the bottom, black in the middle and green above. Each one had a number that I somehow knew to be the amount of uses that would correspond to an amount of time for effectiveness.

If mana was in the green zone, the flash would be stronger and have the longest effective blind time. As I stared at it longer, I could see that where it was in the black, it would only give me five points in Luck. But as it refilled with mana, the points grew higher as well. The golden hue of the mana made me think of luck, and as I pulled my knife shuna out to look at it, I found that the green and black hue of the core there corresponded to dexterity. But why the black?

I touched it and saw that it was the mutation that the moss lion had displayed. This one was a sort of taint that made it hungrier. The more I activated this core, the more mana would siphon from it with each use.

I closed my eyes and the view fell away. The green zone of the knife shuna was larger, but so was the red zone, which meant that it was bottoming out on mana and the ability would be least effective and more likely to make the core shatter.

A soft knock made me blink as I turned to the door and stood, flowing to my feet in a way that was almost scary. Even moving to the door was off putting and would take getting used to.

I opened the door to find Xanile standing there with Treat looming behind her in the hallway, “Hello Saemus, are you ready?” I shook my head and she looked inside my room, “Wow, you did all of this?”

“I did. Give me a moment to finish getting ready and I’ll be right with you.” She nodded once staring at my room as I closed the door slowly.

I put all my weight items back on activating them with the command word and put the shuna’s onto my belt and in the sheath hanging from it. I found that at least I had boots waiting for me in the chute and put them on. There was a felt lining to the anklets so they didn’t rub against my skin and irritate my ankles as I walked with the new boots on.

These ones fit much better and I wondered how they knew I would need them, then figured that Winfred could have said something to them.

Ready at last, I met with Xanile in the hall and smiled, “Ready to go!”

She grinned and we began our walk toward the training forest, the flow of her stride and that of the specter badger following us making me all too aware that I was moving differently now, even with the weight on. I felt lighter, more in tune with my surroundings and the disorientation was starting to make it difficult to focus.

“Are you alright?” Xanile asked softly as we passed through a hallway with students crowding around waiting for something.

“Just getting used to the weight.” I lied easily. I didn’t want to tell her too much if I didn’t need to. Frix had said that there were people using me, and though I had an idea as to who could be, I wasn’t sure about her. “You?”

“I am fine.” She glanced at the wall next to us. “My mother and father found out about the duel.”

I blinked at her and focused on walking for a moment until it had been silent long enough and the flow of the conversation had become stilted. “Do they disapprove?”

“Yes, but not of you.” She frowned and sighed. “They were disappointed that it was someone else challenging my aggressors to a duel and not me. They said that you were more Doranda than I am.”

I stopped and stared at her, my weight settling in the center of my feet uncomfortably, “Your sister abuses your good name by calling you lazy, and your parents treat you like that—why do you care about the family name so much?”

She stared at me as if I had just slapped her and I cursed my straightforward tongue mentally. “Sorry, family is a tough topic for both of us. You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to.”

She reached back and patted Treat on the head as the badger strode forward and the students around us broke into whispers and fearful gasps as we stood together in the center of the walkway. After a moment she nodded once and once more began to walk toward the training forest with Treat and I in tow.

It took us another fifteen minutes of awkward silence and reaching the tree line before Xanile stopped out procession and said, “I deal with it because it is the only thing I know.”

“With the abuse from your family?” She nodded. “Xanile, that’s not okay. You’re powerful! You can make a difference!”

She just shook her head and countered, “Which is why I know I can prove myself to all of them. I can prove them all wrong and make them see that I am worthy of this name and will do them proud!”

I frowned, not knowing what to say, or how to help her. Did I have the right to? I was really on her good side to try and weasel my way out of my sentence and conscription. She likely knew that, but still, knowing that her family was so…cruel. Though they weren’t here and were likely worried, I had to think that my family would at least be round that I was trying my best to survive.

Though the poison thing may cast a bit of a pallor on that.

Shame clung to my heart, now more than ever. Because if it came to light what had happened, not only would I fall, but so would she. I just sighed and shook my head, “If you want to earn their support, then so be it. Do they do double’s duels?”

“I do not know, but if they do, I will be there to fight with you.” She was absolutely confident as she said it, then turned to her new companion who had her head buried into a root system looking for something. “Treat, come on. We need to find some beast cores!”

**

It had taken us the majority of the afternoon to hunt the appropriate creatures in the forest with the normal means. I didn’t want to be any more of a stand out even with her if I had to try and escape some day. I needed to hide as much of what I could do as possible.

I did help her track with Treat huffing and puffing along with us. She wasn’t as likely to help as harm us, but a few times she took a swipe at any beast that came too close to her. It looked to be more for fun than anything else.

I could tell Xanile was growing frustrated at not being able to find anything of worth and it was wearing on her bearing. Sighing softly I leaned against a tree like I was stretching my leg and had Frix send a pulse of mana through the area.

There was nothing in our immediate vicinity and I wondered why until I saw the reason stalking forward like a beacon.

Lialarn stood in front of us, “Back again so soon?” She raised an eyebrow at both of us and looked a mess. Her hair was a nest of twigs and leaves and she looked tired as she stared at us both. “I’ve been making sure that the rest of the wards are up to snuff. What are you doing?”

“Perfecting our powers?” Xanile offered and smiled. I just stayed quiet. Had she been out here all night because of the specter badger? Had she tried to get to her item without us?

“Well, all of the wards are in place and firmly locked now, so you shouldn’t have to worry about anything like that badger of yours attacking you all any time soon.” She yawned and stared at us some more. “I trust your training went well last night?”

I reached out and formed a Protectis in front of me, leaving it bare behind me and thickening it before me so that she was blurry. “Very well done.” She clapped softly and closed her eyes. “Well, the slumber spell I put on the beasts in the area should be about to wear off. If you want to hunt unmolested, I would hurry and find something.”

She grinned as she walked through us unsteadily and as she moved past me, I could smell the coppery scent of blood. Looking down, there was a small dribble down her leg that left a trail on the ground as she moved through the two of us, Treat growling at her menacingly enough that the woman stumbled away from the beast.

We waited until she was well out of earshot before I muttered, “She tried to get it without us.”

“And if she did?” Xanile replied mildly as she strode forward. “She has given us an opportunity regardless. She is as Fae as you and me—just as likely to try and turn a situation as favorable to herself as anyone else. Just because the greys hide behind the ‘balance’ and all that does not mean that they are less likely to lie to us. Or cheat us. If anything, they are just more adept.”

That made me frown, Could that be true? Do I need to consider the option that the Grey Elves are also a threat to the forest?

Crashing ahead drew our attention and made both of us drop lower to the ground in crouches before we chanced glances at each other.

We tried to move as quietly as possible but as soon as we were close enough to make out what the noise had been, Treat crashed through both of us and threw herself on top of a writhing creature that hissed and spat vehemently as another four or five of the same creature circled a smaller more feral creature.

“What are those things?” Xanile hissed through the hisses and small squeaking snarls.

The majority of the creatures were snake-like creatures with two or three heads weaving in the air that surrounded a monsoongoose. The slick creature had a pond just behind it, but it wouldn’t offer much of an advantage against all of them and even with the poison resistance in had, it would fall victim if all those creatures bit it.

“Hydra vipers, and there are a lot more of them than I have ever even had nightmares about here.” I almost groaned when the snapping heads that Treat had been trying to pounce on turned toward us and hissed a warning to the others.

Two of the snake creatures had a single head turn our way and slip tongues out to taste the air as I grunted to Xanile, “Get to high ground!”

She didn’t hesitate and climbed up the tree closest to her as I touched the tree to my right and repeated one of the tricks I had used on the moss lion. The roots in the ground bent to my will and shot into the air in front of us as only one of the creatures turned our way to investigate us.

It sped forward as the leaves above me shook and I turned to find a different snake-like beast bearing down on me with a flickering tongue snapping forward at my chin.