Edwin obediently stayed where he was and chewed through the majority of his travel rations until Leodin returned from the village a while later. Accompanying him was what seemed like most of Gerron’s Vale, including headwoman Morna and the blacksmith.

“Heard you got yourself chewed on by a direwolf.” The headwoman said in place of a greeting as she walked up to Edwin. She raised her eyebrows when she saw the bandages. “That really doesn’t look good.”

“Bah, you should see the other guy.” Edwin chuckled. “I’m fine. Well, mostly.”

“Right…” she drawled and exchanged a look with Bordan who rolled his eyes. “Anyway, we brought a few carts with us, I figured we’d load him as well as the wolves up and head back to the village.”

“Sounds good.” Bordan agreed. “Where are they?”

“There’s a path a few hundred meters that way.” Morna replied, pointing her thumb over shoulder. “Gather up your stuff, I want to be back before sundown.”

The villagers rigged up a makeshift stretcher from two young trees and a cloak and Edwin rolled onto it. Then they lifted him up under a storm of curses. As it turned out, Edwin was very heavy. Being two meters tall and excessively muscled was already bad enough, but his reinforced skeleton added even more weight. The six carriers quickly called over a few more and set off to where they’d left the carts.

“Why’d it have to be him who got injured?” One of them complained. “Why not the girl?”

“I wouldn’t have minded carrying her.” Another added. “Would’ve volunteered to do it all on my own, even.”

“She’s an adventurer, Uve.” A third one barked. “She’d kick your ass even without legs.”

With that last comment, the conversation devolved into howling laughter and a storm of insults which only ended when they arrived at the carts and had to set Edwin down to lift him in. The carts were small, more like oversized wheelbarrows, clearly designed to be navigated along the narrow forest paths the hunters used. After Edwin was delivered, the three wolves followed, and within half an hour from their arrival, everything was loaded up and the group set off to Gerron’s Vale. Edwin was trying to find a comfortable position in his carriage, the wooden bed too short and too narrow for his frame, idly listening to the villagers’ discussion about the quality of the wolf carcasses when his enhanced ears picked out a more interesting conversation. The other adventurers were trailing behind the villagers and Bordan was catching Leodin up on the story Edwin had told them. Even with his improvements, Edwin was barely able to make out their words over the sounds around him, but he closed his eyes and focused.

“Huh.” Leodin said. “Ain’t that a thing. Do you believe him?”

“I don’t know.” Bordan answered. “I mean, it would explain it, but… Salissa, do you think he might be a mage?”

“No.” She said decisively. “He isn’t.”

“How do you know?”

“I checked. Several times. You don’t know this, but when we were camping out in the forest, he helped me with my telekinesis. I thought he was making fun of me, but then he explained it to me more clearly than any of my instructors at the College. I thought the same thing as you: ‘How could a non-mage know so much about magic?’, so I scanned him.”

There was a short pause, and Edwin imagined the empty looks on Leodin and Bordan’s faces.

“It’s like this.” Salissa continued. “It’s a… spell, if you will. I shoot out a pulse of energy that passes through most things, like a person’s body. If it hits any kind of mana, it bounces back to me, and I can feel it. Edwin has only a very small amount.”

“So he could be a weak mage, maybe?” Leodin asked.

“No. Every living thing has some mana inside of them, but mages have a core that’s filled with it. It’s like the difference between a candle and a bonfire.”

“Could he have hidden it somehow? With magic, I mean?” Leodin asked.

“No. The scan detects any kind of mana, so if somebody used magic to obfuscate their core, the spell itself would reflect the pulse. It’s impossible to fool. Edwin is definitely not a mage.”

They walked in silence for a few steps, then Bordan spoke up again.

“That’s a relief. I was worried he might be a rogue mage or something, and we’d have to report him to the Mage’s College. That still leaves us with a mystery. Does his story really explain what he knows?”

More silence, then Salissa spoke up hesitatingly. “I mean, if he was taught about magic from a young age, he would know a lot. Mages only join the academy once their core develops, which is during puberty. He would have years of a lead on them.”

“So, you believe him?” Bordan asked.

“I can’t think of any other explanation. It did sound…weird, though. I can’t put my finger on it, but I feel like he’s hiding something.”

“He said he didn’t want to talk about his family, right?” Leodin said. “That’s probably why. He left out parts that had to do with them, because he doesn’t want us to know who he is.” Leodin stopped, then continued in a conspiratorial tone. “You know, I’ve thought for a while that he’s probably a noble.”

“A noble?” Salissa asked, surprise and hesitation in her voice. “What makes you say that?”

“Sometimes he acts or talks weird. Like when we were in the Guildmaster’s office, he suddenly spoke differently. Didn’t you notice?”

The question was probably addressed to Bordan, as he was the one who answered.

“I didn’t but I was very… preoccupied then. A noble, huh. It’s possible, I guess. That might also help explain his knowledge about magic, the person who taught him might have been a family member. There are more noble mages, right?”

“It’s about half and half, actually, but there are obviously fewer nobles, so they are more likely to have mages in the family.” Salissa answered.

“Maybe he ran away from home because he was supposed to marry or join the army or something!” Leodin speculated animatedly.

“Okay, relax, Leodin. This isn’t a fairytale.” Bordan scolded. “First of all, we don’t know for sure if he’s a noble or not. Secondly, it’s none of our damn business even if he is. As long as he isn’t a fugitive mage or breaking the law in some other way, he has a right to his secrets. We all have things in our past we don’t want to talk about after all.”

That shut the conversation down.

Thanks, Bordan. Edwin thought. You’re a lifesaver. I don’t know how much snooping my cover could’ve handled.

Edwin definitely hadn’t intended a noble heritage to be part of his back story, but he was perfectly happy with them speculating about it. Anything that led them further away from the truth and kept them busy was appreciated. As it turned out, it was much harder to pretend to be somebody else than he’d imagined.

They arrived back in town without incident, and Edwin was (literally) carted off to have his injuries looked at by what constituted a healer in the sticks: Somebody’s grandma. The wizened old woman was one of the better examples of her profession as far as Edwin was concerned, mostly because she was stuffing him with delicious cookies, but also because she wouldn’t allow Edwin’s worried teammates in the room while she worked. When she took off his bandages, however, she was surprised. The wounds on his legs had already closed, looking like a network of scabs and fresh scars instead of raw flesh that seeped blood. His arm looked worse, as the bites had parted his flesh and muscle all the way to his bone and his improved healing had simply attached the ends of the wounds, but even there no blood flowed.

“You just got these?” She asked, poking Edwin suspiciously.

“It wasn’t as bad as my companions thought.” Edwin answered between a mouthful of cookies. “And I heal quickly.”

She kept prodding and turning him for a while, then shrugged.

“Hmph. I guess. It looks bad, though. I don’t think you’ll ever be able to use your arm properly unless you go see a mage healer once you’re back in the city. I’ll make you poultices to help with the recovery and against inflammation, and you should stay off your feet for a while, but aside from that all you need is hot food and sleep.”

She was more correct than she thought. Edwin’s body naturally sought to restore its original state, and with enough raw materials, meaning food and mana, any wound would eventually heal perfectly, even regrowing missing flesh.

Seeing as Edwin was still caked in mud, a tub of hot water was prepared for him to wash himself before the old woman applied the new bandages. After she finished, Edwin eagerly followed her recommendation to wolf down an entire pot of stew, then let himself be helped to bed by Bordan and Leodin.