Chapter Text
Find the missing student. It should have been a trivial problem to solve. I could find anything, and the students on this research trip were all Amaurotines and therefore nearly as sessile as trees. The good kind of trees, at least. Four of them had not heard the alarum raised in the research camp and returned as they should. I had brought back three no worse for wear, but the fourth was proving surprisingly challenging to locate. Which shouldn’t have been the case for many, many reasons, not least of which was the dry comment from the Akadamia professor before I’d set out that, “knowing that boy, he likely fell asleep somewhere.”
My heart was attempting to climb out of my chest through my throat, and I was trying not to panic. I’d find him. Of course I’d find him. That’s what I do.
I’d reached another short stretch of footprints that abruptly terminated. Of course he keeps teleporting. I hadn’t even met this boy, and already wanted to grab him and shake him. Following his path through the aether was easy, as he’d left a shockingly wide trail, (what were they feeding boys in Amaurot to make their aether that dense?) but retracing his steps through the woods as he flitted around like a petalouda was taking far too much time, and I really needed to locate him—alive, preferably—and get him back to his research camp so I could tackle the much more difficult and fun part of my task.
He was, of course, asleep when I found him. With his cowl up. As though he thought he were in a city park and not the wilderness. Sprawled on the fulm-deep moss of the meadow, half-reclining against a tree.
What kind of person travels seven thousand malms just to take a nap? Was the first thought that sprang to mind. Did they not have sunbeams in Amaurot? Was he researching bad life choices? But I had no time to dwell upon the strange boy’s peculiarities, as the damned lotis I’d been hoping to beat to his location also stumbled into the meadow and charged.
I threw myself into its path, shield raised, and caught the lotis perhaps a yalm from the somehow still sleeping Amaurotine. As the predatory plant roared and snapped, trying to reach one of its three heads past my guard towards its intended prey, the fool finally awoke.
“What in—” he began, but I cut him off with a shout.
“Run!” I’d thought that would be obvious, but apparently not. And then I heaved the lotis backward with my shield and attempted to prune the sensory tendrils from the head that was currently trying to bite me with a swing of my sword.
I did not look to see if the sleeping beauty did as I asked. But I heard, faintly, the sound of teleportation magick and fervently hoped he’d returned to his class. The plant I was grappling with, meanwhile, had grasped hold of my shield in one of its many maws and was trying to shake me.
I was not. Going to be moved. By a plant.
I dug my feet into the soft ground and pushed back. And then a massive fireball struck the lotis from behind.
What?
The lotis screamed and tried to sweep me out of the way so it could turn on this new threat, but I chopped through one of its feet with my blade, and it gouged a trench in the moss of the meadow trying to thrash away from me.
Another fireball struck it, and the lotis lashed blindly out behind itself with its tail. Which was also a mouth. Who approves these damned concepts? From somewhere behind the lotis came mild cursing. So that could be anywhere from slightly to severely bad. I needed to get the lotis’ primary weapons pointed away from the definitely most infuriating person I had ever rescued to date. Fine then. I grabbed hold of one of the woody necks and pulled. Dragging it in an arc about ninety degrees so that none of the snapping maws or feet were angled towards the boy.
The next fireball caught the inflorescences on the plant’s back and set them ablaze.
Noxious green fumes escaped as they burned, but the lotis ceased moving. Trimming off the flowers had made it revert from its ambulatory state. It now needed to put down roots to regrow. I poked one of the maws with the point of my blade, just to check, but it failed to strike.
I took a breath and lowered my shield.
The foolish boy was still standing on the edge of the meadow, staff in hand, gawping at me. But he appeared otherwise unharmed. Some of the knots in my chest loosened at the sight.
“Thank you.” I managed to say in a reasonably calm voice. Remember that people do not always make the wisest choices in an emergency, I could hear Azem saying to me in that slightly-amused-but-still-scolding tone of hers. “For the fireball. Your research camp raised an alarum.” Two hours ago. I didn’t add. But you didn’t hear it because you were napping. “I’d best return you to your fellow students.”
“What was that creature?” The boy demanded, in a voice that suggested he was personally insulted by its existence, which of all possible responses was the one I had least expected. “Nothing like it was listed in the environmental catalogues for this region.”
I gestured for him to go back up the path, with only a slight indication that I might physically grab hold and turn him around. “That’s because it isn’t from this region. It came from the wetlands on the other side of the mountains.”
He did, at last, turn to walk beside me up the trail towards the camp. “You’re telling me that a carnivorous plant spontaneously wandered across a mountain range?” He managed to make the question sound accusatory. What did he think I was doing? Spinning a tale? He had repeatedly pelted the lotis with fireballs, it was real enough. And although it was difficult to see it with his mask in the way, I could tell he was still staring at me.
“No.” I briefly considered grabbing him and teleporting us both back to the camp to end this encounter faster. That would definitely get back to Azem, however, and it wasn’t as if I needed another lecture on propriety. I know you love the people of Etheirys, dear one, but you might want to show that without hitting them. She’d said that so often I could almost mimic her inflection word-for-word. “It wasn’t spontaneous. Something,” I paused for emphasis, “drove it here. Along with a number of other large, unhappy specimens of flora and fauna.” Hopefully, that would sink in, and the fool boy would possibly, finally realize that he was in danger, and had been for quite some time.
“And you know this because…?” The boy drawled insultingly and really, all of Azem’s lectures on how traumatized people respond to crisis aside, I wanted to pick him up and throw him.
“Because I came here. To find. Whatever displaced them.” I was not going to lose my temper on this idiot. Even if he did deserve it. I took a deep breath, trying to dispel the urge to shout. It would be a bad idea with so many dangerous creatures about in any case.
He was still surreptitiously staring at me.
Shite. What was wrong? Had I lost my mask in the scuffle? A hand to my face proved it was still in place. My cowl was down because I wasn’t foolish enough to leave it up in a forest, and a glance showed that my robes were not any more covered in sap and leaves and ichor than I would have expected after battling several irate plants. However messy it had become, my hair wasn’t so strange as to warrant—oh. Oh no. Realization dawned, and an ice-cold sensation bloomed in the pit of my stomach.
Soulsight.
Now I really did want to teleport him back to the camp.
“Hold on a moment.” How was it possible that every word out of his mouth sounded more indignant than the last? Did he practice that? “You mean to find whatever chased a giant, carnivorous plant across the mountains alone?” He stepped in front of me and stopped, blocking the path.
I sighed.
What would Azem do in this situation? My imagination failed. Azem would never get into this mess. Nobody like this infuriating boy would ever dare bother her for rescuing him. Azem would just… exist at him. All calm and commanding and ethereal. And he would regret every decision he’d ever made in his entire boring Amaurotine life.
If I lived a hundred thousand years, I could never hope to be like her.
“No.” I explained. I was calm. I was collected. Probably. I was not going to think about shaking this boy. “I am taking you back to your research camp. Then, I mean to find the thing alone.”
Now that he was directly in front of me, he was staring more openly. I braced myself for the inevitable volley of intensely personal questions that were bound to follow. Yes, I was fine, I was almost certainly not on fire. Yes, it always looked like that. No, I don’t know why.
He scoffed. Scoffed! “Well, that’s absurd. Obviously, I’m going with you. I can hardly allow some monstrosity to remain loose in the wild to threaten unsuspecting researchers.”
Unsuspecting researchers like you. I managed not to say aloud. “You do realize that whatever I’m looking for is likely bigger and meaner than the lotis back there? With probably even more mouths and tentacles for eyeballs or something?”
“Tentacles for eyeballs?” I could tell he was rolling his eyes, even with the mask in the way.
“Just be glad you didn’t get a closer look at the lotis that tried to eat you.” I muttered. Every single thing that came from the Words of Halmarut was worse than the last. Amaurotines were, so far as I could tell, a society consisting of naught but terrible ideas.
He was taken aback by that. I’m not sure he’d actually looked at the lotis at all. Wonderful. He’d probably been staring at my abnormal soul for the entire battle. “Still.” He huffed, “The point remains that it will almost certainly be too much for a single person.”
It was my turn to gawp at him. The boy was so innately infuriating that I had somehow missed the important detail that he was… for some reason asking to come with me to find a dangerous, unknown probably-monster.
“I…” What would Azem tell me to do about this? I wracked my brain, but none of the likely answers seemed to be teleport him to the camp and run away. Words were failing me, fleeing my thoughts like students on a tea break. “To be honest, nobody has ever insisted on going with me to fight a monster before,” I absolutely did not intend for that to come out, but it did anyway, shite, “and I have no idea how to respond to that.” I finished with typical lack of grace. Azem! Help! How do I fix this? I had to fight the urge to teleport to her side and beg for help.
It was supposed to be finding a monster. I was usually so good at this.
The boy continued to stare at me like I was an idiot. Which. I was. But at least I was an idiot who knew what danger was, which put me far ahead of sleeping beauty.
“Well?” He drawled, and I could not for the life of me imagine how he managed to make every single thing he said sound so insulting. “Are we searching for this creature, or not?”
He actually wanted to come with me. Towards trouble. I… that was…
“Stay close.” I said. And I led the way.
I could have gone back to the meadow to pick up the trail the lotis had followed, but there was no need. I knew every single angry plant and ravenous bog beast I’d found out of its environment that morning came from the wetlands. I knew there was only one pass the various displaced creatures could have come through. I could track them back to their point of origin from there.
It was several awkward minutes of silently hiking through the woods with the most irritating boy on the star before he finally spoke.
“Your cowl is down.” He said it as though maybe I hadn’t noticed.
“We’re in the wilderness.” Patience. Graciousness. I tried to think of the other words Azem was always telling me to try to have when talking to people. Forbearance. Dignity. No punching. “With hostile lifeforms around. I need my peripheral vision.”
After a beat, he pushed his down as well. Tousled white hair and skin that had clearly never seen the sun. I guessed they really didn’t have sunbeams in Amaurot.
I stifled a smile, realizing that he had made his decision to follow me into danger without first stopping to ask me any more pertinent questions, such as “who are you?” or, “what in heaven’s name possessed you to search for an unknown monster in the middle of nowhere?” or “what’s wrong with your soul?” And I could only guess from his general… everything that he was holding back the questions purely because he didn’t want to admit he didn’t know.
To be fair, I hadn’t asked him any questions either. But I already knew who he was and what he was doing there—at least generally—from the professor leading the research camp who’d asked me to find him. Speculating on the details of why he was so incredibly infuriating and just how completely foolish he was could entertain me later when I had to report how all this had gone to Azem.
We arrived at the pass without any further questions, (although plenty of complaints about the abundance of tree roots across the trail, the biting insects, and both the presence and absence of wind) which I found simultaneously a relief and a worry. Did that mean he was saving them all up, or…? I pushed the thought away to focus on the task at hand.
I didn’t need to peer into the past to see the migration had been frantic. Fear and desperation still lingered in the air. The tracks on the earth were obvious, which was a weight off my heart, as I truly didn’t want to have to immerse myself in the memories there to find the trail. Whatever I was seeking, it was terror enough to move mountains.
I couldn’t wait to see it with my own eyes.
But I felt something stirring in the rocks ahead. I held my breath, listening, and shifted my vision slightly ahead to see where the ambush would land. As gifts go, foresight is usually more burden than boon. No soul benefits from visions of random moments that could lie at any distance or direction along the plane of time. The likelihood your trajectory will transit one of those points is abysmal. But my view of time was shallow. I could see no more than a few minutes away in any direction. Which actually made it a useful power. Some of the time. I moved to the shelter of a boulder and motioned for the boy to follow.
“What are we doing?” He demanded, although even his dull Amaurotine senses must have picked up some sign of danger, because it came out in an irate whisper.
“Something’s coming.” I said softly. I still couldn’t see it clearly, but I doubted it was the thing we were seeking. I blinked to pull my focus back to the present.
He drew forth his staff. “What kind of something?”
“I don’t know.” I grinned, excited. I couldn’t help it. “Let’s find out.”
A minotaur leapt down from the cliffs above us, landing in a shower of gravel, brandishing an uprooted tree as a club.
It roared. I drew my sword and roared back at it, eliciting a bewildered look from sleeping beauty. Yes, well. I had manners and he didn’t. The minotaur, unlike the lotis, belonged in this region, though they rarely strayed into the forest from the higher elevations of the mountainside. We were intruding on its domain. There were customs to observe.
It smashed its tree-club against the earth. Once. Twice. Three times. I answered by clanging my sword against my shield thrice. The minotaur stretched out its neck as far as it could towards me and sniffed. I sniffed back, breathing in the scent of warm damp fur, granite dust baked in the sun, and old, dried blood. Then it grunted and clambered back up the rocky cliff like a goat.
They were surprisingly nimble for such large bipeds.
“What.” The boy was staring at me again. Wonderful. “Was that about?”
“We’re permitted through the pass now.” I replied.
“Are you trying to claim that you speak minotaur?” he demanded, incredulous. And you know… as impossible as he was, I was starting to find his atrocious behavior funny? Was that due to altitude sickness? Possibly.
“Of course not,” I managed to say with a perfectly straight face, “minotaurs can’t speak.” And I led the way through the pass before I could start snickering.
We began our descent into the valley.
The boy was breathing hard. I slowed my pace slightly. On reflection, I was frankly surprised he’d managed to keep up with me for so long. I’d never been to Amaurot, but from everything I’d heard it was mostly flat, entirely paved, and full of teleportation nodes. He’d probably never walked this much in his entire life, let alone up and down a mountain. Which he had done without complaining about somehow. Even though he hadn’t exactly scrupled to hold back his complaints about everything else in existence. Possibly because he didn’t want to remind me how wildly inappropriate it was that I’d agreed to bring him along.
He wasn’t prepared for this. He’d just woken up from a nap, he didn’t have water or… I winced, suddenly feeling extremely bad about not having stuck to my decision to drag him to the research camp, tried to cover my expression. Failed. And then decided to just… run with it. I staggered, as if in pain, over to the edge of the trail, and sat down on the ground.
“Give me a moment.” I said. As if I were the one who needed a rest. Making a show of clutching my entirely hale right leg.
I don’t know if he actually bought the act, but he collapsed on the ground beside me. I pulled out my canteen, took a swig, and offered it to him. He accepted it, still too exhausted and out of breath to say something irritating, and after a single wary glower at the canteen mouth, he took a long drink.
“How far must we go to find this monster?” He finally asked, handing the canteen back to me. It was, shockingly, the first thing he’d managed to say that didn’t sound insulting.
I didn’t want to have to say it, but he had followed me up and down a mountain without question, and he didn’t even know who I was. (Though if I’d told him that, he probably would have sensibly returned to the camp, so… perhaps not my best choice there.) He’d earned some candor. “It’s hard to be certain.” I stretched, vaguely hoping he would take the hint and do the same. “The lotis that attacked you came from a hanging valley about a malm from here. As did the rest of the wildlife I found straying into the forest around your camp. That’s the most likely place to find the problem, but…”
He frowned. “But the trouble may not have originated there. Or it may not be waiting for us when we arrive.” He did take the hint and followed my example in trying to keep his limbs from cramping. Miraculous.
“The only way to know is to go and see.” My foresight didn’t extend quite that far. Not with any sort of clarity. But I felt a convergence of events leading me that way. The current of time rushing, pulling me onward. Something would be there. I rummaged through my pack and found a bag of walnuts. I took one and handed him the rest. He had now managed to say two things to me with tolerable civility, and I was feeling increasingly terrible that I had agreed to bring him along. It was my job to protect him. I wasn’t supposed to be leading people into peril and harm and subjecting them to hardships just because for a moment I’d felt as if they were like me.
This had never happened before, and I couldn’t think of a single thing Azem had ever told me that might suffice now.
Rise to the occasion. Be patient with others, little one. Don’t call them, “useless Amaurotines” to their faces. I was excellent at finding things. Trouble, most particularly. Better by far than any of the others. And good at solving problems. Most of them. But of all Azem’s students I was by far the worst with people. And I knew it. And she knew it. And so did all my peers. Iris would have been a picture of compassion, and kindness, and serenity, and persuaded this boy to go back to his professors without difficulty. Iris never did anything wrong. And certainly never got lectured for picking people up and chucking them around like sacks of wheat when they wouldn’t cooperate. Euphrosyne would have laughed and teased him until he’d admitted defeat and safely returned to his studies. Endymion…
Actually, he wouldn’t have known what to do about this boy either, and that was some comfort. But he’d still have handled sleeping beauty better than I had.
Being Azem’s worst, most notorious, and least promising student had its advantages. Never being sent on errands to Amaurot, for one. Never having to deal with the Convocation and their politics, unlike poor Iris. Mostly getting the fun tasks, like finding deadly monsters and solving perilous mysteries. Never having to take the Fourteenth Seat, with all its responsibility for every life upon the star.
But the disadvantages… constantly failing the people of Etheirys, disappointing Venat, being me…
I got to my feet. The sooner we found what I was seeking, the better off this boy would be. Hopefully. I just had to find a probably-monster somewhere, return it to the star, and keep this boy who had already done a vast number of very foolish things from doing anything foolish in the meantime.
Right. Simple. This was going to end in flames, probably.
The boy rose with a groan. He was going to be miserable tomorrow. Assuming. That he survived the rest of today, that is.
I led us down the slope, along what was not so much a trail as the swath of destruction left behind by the passage of terrified wildlife. At least there wasn’t much question of which way to go.
He was breathing easier, but I could tell the boy’s gait had changed. He’d probably done a number on his feet with all this hiking. My conscience wrestled with my patience for control of my tongue.
“What do you study?” I asked, having lost the battle of not opening up the floor to personal questions in hopes of distracting him from his aches and pains.
“Aetherology.” He replied. Which was a bit of a surprise, honestly. An environmental science, I would have expected. Or a specialized field of Creation, like ornithology, or botany. Aether was everywhere. There was little reason to join a research outing to the mountains a continent away to study its behavior. Either he picked up on my confusion, or he was used to being questioned on the matter, because he launched into an explanation unasked. “One of the major aetherial wind currents, which spans several continents, emerges from this mountain.”
That. Made some sense. And I hadn’t known that, actually. So, Azem would be pleased I’d learned something new. Assuming. That I didn’t have to tell her the tale of how I’d dragged some boy to his untimely end. “What were you hoping to observe, exactly?”
“Changes in the polarity of the aether.” He made a sweeping gesture at our surroundings. “By the time this current reaches Amaurot, it lists slightly towards the umbral. Unusual behavior for wind aether. I wanted to find out if it began so, or if it shifts somewhere along the flow. And none of the records I searched had any answers.”
All right. So. He’d traveled seven thousand malms from Amaurot to look at an aether current. Which had no real practical application whatsoever. Merely because it was a mystery he wished to solve.
I was not going to think more deeply about that. I had made enough mistakes for one day.
“You’re not from Amaurot.” He said. It was both an observation and a question. Had it… never occurred to him that mankind lived anywhere else upon the star until that moment? Probably. I wasn’t going to ask how he knew that because it was obvious from my accent, if naught else.
“No.” I answered the question. At least the audible part of it. “I’ve never even been to Amaurot.” Probably every village, town, and hamlet on Etheirys, yes. Amaurot? No. And never would, if Fate were kind. I knew what he was really asking, but I hoped he would leave it at that.
“Do you come from these mountains, then?” That was a reasonable guess, I had to admit. Wrong, but still reasonable. And asked without any accusation or indignation whatsoever.
“No, my mentor sent me here early this morning to investigate the displaced wildlife.” That… somewhat answered the question. Didn’t it? No. No, it did not. And I knew it. I stifled the urge to sigh. Iris wouldn’t have wriggled and squirmed around the most simple, personal questions, but then Iris knew what the answers were.
“Where do you come from, then?” There it was. And only a tiny bit irate.
Better to get this over with.
“Nowhere.” I shrugged. “Or everywhere, depending upon how you look at it.” He was staring at me again, which was increasingly rude, but I couldn’t entirely blame him for it this time. “I don’t know where I came from. I was a foundling before my mentor took me in.”
I watched his face go through a series of frowns. I hadn’t known before that moment that a person could have an entire repertoire of frowns. I would have thought they had just one. A frown. Not so with this boy. He excelled at frowning the way I excelled at trouble.
I needed to distract him from further questions I didn’t have answers to. Or worse: questions I did have answers to, but were deeply embarrassing. Conversation, however, was not exactly my strength. Strength was my strength, generally speaking. Heaven help me, I could already hear the lecture I was going to get from Azem later about being sociable. What did normal people talk about? I had no idea.
“Do currents of aetheric wind often spring from mountains?” I asked. Because, while I knew quite a lot about mountains in general, and this mountain in particular, I did not know much about the aetherology of mountains. “I would have expected earth, or perhaps water instead.”
That worked. Now that the subject of his expertise had come up, he was animated. If smug. Which was a good sign. More like the boy I’d found in the meadow, and perhaps less traumatized than the one stumbling after me down the mountain.
“Lesser aetheric currents often originate where a surfeit of the element in question may be found.” He actually straightened up while saying this. “But major currents are quite the opposite. They invariably begin where their elemental aspect is weakest.” And I realized I had likely stumbled directly onto the thesis of his research paper. Well, at least he was happy now. “And no one knows the why or how of it.”
“So… if the wind current is umbrally charged along its whole length, does that mean Mount Elbrus is slightly astral?” We were nearing the edge of the wetlands. The hanging valley was shaped more or less like a bowl, the rock of the mountain having been scooped away by the persistent work of a glacier that had long since ceded itself to the warmth of the sun. The marsh encompassed the majority of the valley floor. Not much farther to go.
“I mean to find that out.” His voice was slightly hushed. Perhaps he sensed the danger that called to me from the mist-shrouded bog. Perhaps his soulsight could pick out our quarry from here. “This is the place, is it not?”
I nodded and tried to look ahead. Numerous indistinct shapes, all deadly, all unpredictable, shimmered around us. I didn’t know enough about whatever was here to see its future more clearly. But time churned like rapids here. Whatever this was, I doubted it would be other, different, displaced wildlife.
“I think it’s here.” I drew my sword and shield from the aether. “Follow me.”
I doubted we would have to search long for our quarry.
We picked our way through the marsh, my foresight mainly aiding us in finding solid ground to tread upon through the mist and the reeds which made land and water indistinguishable from one another.
The creature that emerged from the mists looked like naught I had ever seen before. I couldn’t even loosely classify it, and that was frustrating. It was at least three times the size of the lotis. It had legs reminiscent of the minotaur’s ending in hoofed feet. Four of them. And two front limbs like a mantis, perhaps for skewering prey. So almost certainly a predator. Multiple sets of wings. I wasn’t certain how many exactly. And the gaping maw full of sharp teeth I fully expected, although I was not entirely sure how many of them it possessed, and was the entire thing a maw? But I did not anticipate that its head would not be… attached. To the rest of its body. I stared at it for a moment, astonished.
“What, in the name of sanity, is that supposed to be?” the boy gasped, which was much the same thing I was thinking, but more cross.
“I have no idea.” This could be a problem. I needed to know what it could do in order to accurately predict what it was going to do. “Whatever that is, it didn’t come from anywhere nearby.” Or anywhere I have ever heard of. Or quite possibly anywhere upon this star. I didn’t add. I might have been willing to throw myself at it once just to find out what it was capable of, but not now. With a random boy in tow. Who was liable to get hurt in the process of trying to help me.
The random boy in question frowned. Which I was getting used to. Almost as much as the staring by this point. “It’s an arcane entity of some kind.” He whispered. So yes, I had been correct about the soulsight. “And extremely water-aspected.”
Well, that was more than I’d known before, which was helpful. And… it made this a bad place to fight the thing. The wetlands existed in this hanging basin because of a spring. If the valley were just a little less bowl-shaped, this would be the headwaters of a river. There was no shortage of water-aspected aether for the creature to draw upon.
Which meant we had to lure it out of the marsh.
I explained the problem as succinctly as possible. And added a clarifying, “We need to take it away from the spring,” for good measure because run away had escaped him earlier and I’d thought the context apparent.
He looked back the way we came and pointed. “The rocks over there. That’s where the concentration of water is lowest.”
It was a long way. Which could be tricky. But. It did present an opportunity. I sent him to wait in ambush in the rocks. Which he actually did without arguing, to my astonishment.
Which left me to play the part of the bait.
Azem most often sends me to places where there’s hints and rumors of trouble but nothing known. Partly because I am very good at finding things. And partly because my weird, abnormal soul draws trouble out from wheresoever it may be hiding, in much the way a bonfire draws moths. Attracting the creature’s notice was as simple as walking into the marsh nearby. I had no idea what I would look like to the entity in the mists, whether it would think me predator or prey, but I certainly got its attention.
It roared and charged very swiftly towards me.
I ran as fast as my feet could carry me, through knee-deep water and mud, leaping from one patch of slightly-solid ground to another, unable to risk a teleport because I could lose the creature’s attention. It occasionally spat turbulent streams of water in my direction, and the water level of the marsh was actually rising around me as I ran, which was not a good sign, nor making flight any easier, but was still helpful information about its capabilities. I hit the rocky slope with it still following and kept running.
It chased me to the rocks. Fate was kind.
And the boy waiting there unleashed the largest bolt of lightning I’d ever seen.
I was, unfortunately, somewhat blinded by the lightning strike, but my foresight was not as easily overwhelmed as my vision, and I still managed to dodge the thing’s claws and redirect its anger away from the rocks where the boy was hiding. I was not… hitting it all that well? But defending I could do until the spots cleared from my eyes and I could aim again. The boy, meanwhile, was unleashing bolt after bolt of lightning and shouting. “Mine is the aether”? Really? Well, I was going to have to forgive his choice of battle cries if we lived.
The problem with the battle, from my point of view, was that a creature with its head floating detached above its body had no obvious weak points to strike. Add to that the majority of its bulk appearing to be mouth, I couldn’t guess where to plant a blade. Did it even have vital organs? In the likely event that the boy was correct, and it was arcane in nature, I was going to have to find its weaknesses via the flow of aether through its form and not by physiology. Which was hard to study while it was trying to stab me to death with its forelimbs.
“Stop throwing spells at it!” I shouted. “And tell me where its heart is!” The aether within it had to be circulated from some point. Or points. The lightning was only boiling off the outer layers of it anyway. It had absorbed far, far more from the spring than it needed.
A pause. And then, “Between the… lower wings on its back! Three fulms down!” he shouted.
Now. That I could work with.
I blocked another attempt to skewer me with its front limbs, dodged a blast of water from its maw, tossed my shield aside, braced my feet and jumped. Landing on its back. I briefly considered changing my sword for a spear, but the blade I had was long enough for the job I had in mind.
I stabbed it into the creature’s heart and leapt clear. “There! Aim your lightning at the sword!”
It seemed he had anticipated the request, because the bolt struck almost immediately, my blade conducting the levin-aspected aether directly into the center of its aetherial flow.
I should have expected it to explode. I really don’t know why I didn’t.
It burst like a water balloon, leaving me, and the boy, and everything within the valley drenched.
I stared at the empty place where it had been and started to laugh.
This is the part of my job that I love the most. Keeping people from harm is vital work, and I would never neglect to do it, but it’s entirely stressful. The consequences for failing are… better not to think about. But solving the problem that threatens them? That was pure exhilaration. A puzzle? A mystery? And maybe a little mortal peril? I wouldn’t give that up for anything on the star.
I sat down on the wet gravel slope of the mountain to catch my breath, still trying to get my laughter under control. The boy stumbled down out of the rocks, robes dripping, white locks stuck to his head. “That was madness.” He attempted to wring out his robe, gave up after a moment, and collapsed next to me in a sodden heap, pointing accusingly. “You are completely insane.”
He was definitely not the first person to tell me that.
“Admit it. That was fun, though.” I grinned and punched him in the shoulder. Hopefully... gently enough not to earn another no punching lecture from Azem.
I was… bad at not punching.
He made a scoffing sound. I took that as agreement.
I was feeling just a tiny bit euphoric. The threat was gone. And the fool boy who’d followed me like a lost sheep all day wasn’t even hurt. Wet and grumpy. Does not count as hurt. My aether-vision was nowhere near as keen as his, but even I could tell that despite his truly absurd natural reserve of aether, he was utterly exhausted after a solid day of hiking in the mountains and not one but two pitched battles to the death, and wouldn’t be able to teleport himself back.
I could.
With a flick of my hand, two bright circles of aether appeared around us. He looked puzzled. Possibly, he’d never been translocated by someone else before. I got to my feet. “Time to head back.” I said, and closed the space between here and there.
We materialized at the research camp, him still collapsed on the ground, both of us soaked to the skin, in a blaze of white light. I sometimes wish I could do without that part of the spell, but it is useful in warning people not to get too close. Not that I would ever land on anyone, but I do like my space.
The astonished crowd of students and faculty gave way after a moment to the professor in charge.
“Hades! Thank the stars! You had us worried sick!” he rushed over to help the uninjured but extremely soggy and out-of-sorts boy—who was called Hades, apparently—to his feet. The professor turned to me, overwhelmed, “I cannot thank you enough for bringing him back safely.” Yes. Well. That was at least half my fault. Possibly somewhat more than half. “I hope he was not too much trouble.”
“He was…” I struggled to choose the reply carefully. Infuriating. Impossible. Foolish. The only person I’ve ever met like me. “Helpful, actually.” More people were gathering around. “The source of the disturbed wildlife has been removed. I’ll make a sweep of the surrounds to be certain there’s nothing still astray before I go.”
“Please, convey our deepest thanks to your mistress.” He said. And bowed. As if that were… you don’t bow to Convocation members do you? Even in Amaurot? Why would you bow to a student? Was the bow part of the thanks I was supposed to convey to Venat? I could feel relief and gratitude and euphoria bubbling up all around the camp and I needed to get out before… I don’t know what. Before they were any happier at me, I suppose.
“Of course.” I answered as graciously as I could. And teleported myself out of there as swift as thought, before anyone could stop me.
I knew there was nothing left in the forest. I could feel that the danger had passed. But. I had made so many mistakes already. I wanted to be certain I wasn’t making another one. And I wanted time to figure out what to tell Azem.
I finished my circuit of the forest with the sun beginning to set. I did a quick bit of calculation to determine the local time and peered ahead, trying to guess who’d be at the house when I arrived. With my luck, everyone. I took a deep breath to calm my pounding heart and teleported home.
It was a few hours earlier and thousands of malms closer to Amaurot. The sky here was adorned with feathery wisps of cloud which hadn’t been present in the east. No one appeared to be waiting. Not even Argos, which meant he must be out with Azem. I paused at the door, peering ahead slightly. If I walked in to find Iris or Euphrosyne waiting, I was going to run away and fake my own death. The others liked to try to guess when I’d make my reports so I’d have the largest audience possible. I’m pretty sure they traded tales of my missions amongst themselves. Did I pester Iris to tell me about meeting Convocation members? No. I did not. I was fortunate none of my peers shared my foresight. There was nothing I could see. I pushed the door open and went inside.
I took off my mask and raked my fingers through my hair which was dry now, but completely disheveled. My heart was hammering as I put water on for tea. I was worn out after everything, but I couldn’t sit down. I couldn’t be still. I paced like a caged animal in the kitchen, arms hugging my own body.
Azem walked through the door just as the kettle started to boil.
“Ithas!” She pushed back her cowl and removed her mask, coming over to embrace me. How was it possible that she was always so warm and reassuring, and yet I was always so terrified to tell her what I’d done? “Finished on Elbrus already? That was fast, even for you.” She took the kettle off the flame and began making the tea.
“Yes. It wasn’t that difficult.” Except for the boy who followed me around all day. And I proceeded to tell her about rounding up angry flora and fauna, and the impossible boy, and our battle with the entity in the wetland while she poured us both cups, and brought out an assortment of spiced, candied nutmeats. And made appropriate faces of concern at the right parts of the story, and laughed at my attempts to mimic Hades’ constantly insulting tone of voice.
My description of the monster gave her pause. Even though—or perhaps because—I attempted to be as accurate as possible and didn’t just leave the number of mouths and wings and limbs at, “I’m not sure why or how many.” She had come to the same conclusion I had.
“A Creation, then.” Her voice was grave.
Someone had made the thing in the wetlands. And turned it loose upon the star to threaten other living creatures. Who would do that? And why?
A mystery. And one I wanted to solve.
Azem was lost in thought, contemplating the problem. Then the moment passed, and she was all smiles. “And you made a friend!”
I sputtered, nearly choked, and tea almost came out my nose.
Why. Do I not possess. Even the slightest bit of grace? Or composure? Or… anything?
“I… don’t know about that.” I managed to say finally. And tried to change the subject. “The researchers asked me to convey their thanks to you for your assistance.”
She smiled at me again, and I knew it was a slight admonishment. “Did you allow them to thank you for your assistance?”
No. “Yes. Of course.” I answered, taking the rest of the candy in a single handful. I was going to eat my entire body weight in candied nuts out of spite.
“Ithas.” That was definitely an admonishment. “I know how challenging you find interacting with other people.” She refilled the plate of sweetmeats. Possibly, she was going to help me in my campaign of self-inflicted spite. She was both great and terrible that way. “But challenges exist to be overcome. Rise to the occasion, my dear one. You have it in you.”
What I had in me was mostly nuts. But yes. I understood. Somewhat.
But anything and everything I touched turned to chaos. The boy I was rescuing followed me into battle. The creature in the mountains exploded, for pity’s sake! And while I could sometimes make that… work out in the end, it didn’t make me any less of a menace to everyone nearby. I loved the star and all its people, even the infuriating ones, I truly did. I couldn’t bear—I didn’t need them to love me in return. I just needed them to be safe. From me, most of all.
Venat was looking down at me with those hopeful bright blue eyes. Impossibly kind as ever. And I was still disappointing her, no matter what I did.
“Go clean up and get some rest, little one.” She said, plucking a leaf out of my hair as if I were still the small child who spent all day wandering the hills and came home every night covered in burrs with frogs and field mice and the occasional small bird hidden in my pockets. How long had that been there? Forever, probably.
I took another handful of candy with me as I left.