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The fire, lit in the distance, hidden behind a mountain headland from the Old Camp, was not warm, and did not even seem to give light in the dark night. Milten had already stopped shaking from the nonexistent cold, though. He was just as sick at his heart as the ore miners were likely to be - that they had been held hostage to Gomez's madness, with nowhere to go, nowhere to hide.
But did Milthen care about those poor souls? Oh, Innos, he'd be lying if he answered with even a simple nod.
Diego had barely pulled him out of that mess, and the fire mage was truly grateful to his friend. But still, seriously - an amulet hidden in the crypt? With immense power that "they're going to need soon?" He'd have to be a complete idiot to believe that his friend really needed it at that time. But Milten believed, Milten went - and thus avoided the carnage his friend had anticipated with nothing more than a sixth sense.
Even a bottle of red wine, skillfully hidden in a special pocket of his robe, did not cheer Milten up, nor did it give him the desired haze of oblivion - on the contrary, as if mocking him, his memory pulled out scraps of memories of those left behind in the Old Camp. How they helped him to learn, how kind and non-judgmental they were, and took him in as if he had always been a part of them...
Milten had abandoned his brothers to their deaths, shamefully running away with his tail between his legs - even if he hadn't realized it at the time. Because if he was honest with himself - would he have stayed, knowing? Would he have stayed, hoping that one mage could make a difference...?
No. No, he would have run away anyway. What a coward.
The fire mage took another swing at his bottle, and was not even surprised to notice the shadow that was approaching them from the direction of the Old Camp. He had heard a couple of screams up to that point, and judging by the fact that the shadow was alone, the mage recognized his friend almost unmistakably.
For he was The Son of a Bitch who could get away with anything, literally. Even Diego wasn't that angry with him, even though he'd set the Old Camp up for the New Camp in the heat of the moment...
Milten would have done it too, given tha chance. Perhaps. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been put under that pretty but still deadly Barrier, as well as all the other people he grew to see as close friends.
There were no innocents under the Barrier. There were just creeps who managed to look more or less harmless.
«You two are way too close to the Camp,» the shadow said in his usual strong, smoky voice, «aren't you afraid of being attacked?»
He nods into the darkness, as if pointing in the direction he came from. Milten notices that the bridge guards are no longer holding torches.
That means the guards are no longer there.
«Let them try.» The mage snorted unhappily, slicking back his slightly dirty red hair. Milten knew he looked pathetic, but somehow he didn't see pity or disgust in his friend's eyes as he sat down next to the fire. There was nothing in them but the glow from the fire.
«I heard what happened to the Fire Mages. Diego told me,» he breathed out into the blue scarf, simultaneously eliciting a quiet sigh and tired thought from Milten: «Thank Innos, I won't have to explain»
«I'm sorry about your brothers...»
His friend's gaze stayed on Diego, who stood just north of their camp, staring into the distance. You wouldn't see him if you didn't know he was there, but there was no fooling his friend. Or perhaps his friend just saw the glint from the tip of the arrow Diego held on the bow he held at the ready... or followed him after their dialog. Milten's thoughts were finally becoming foggy from the drink - but unfortunately, not in the right direction.
«But still,» his friends finished with a nod. «I'm damn glad you managed to get out of that meat grinder alive».
The mage wanted to make a sarcastic remark. He wanted to say, "oh, all thanks to you" or something like that, but he couldn't. Milten knew their friend was a traitor. Knew he had been in the Free Mine just a couple days before it was flooded. Knew, he knew damn well he could be to blame for it all... but Milten didn't accuse.
Just because the mage knew nothing would change, even if his friend was the one who flooded it with his bare hands.
«The Water Mages asked me to give Corristo a book that should have been of great interest to him,» his friend grinned, pulling out a leather binder with crisp pages from his bag, «I was supposed to use it to negotiate a mutual aid agreement to break the barrier.... Well, before all of this. But since our mutual friend has left this world untimely, book is turned out absolutely useless for our freedom, and you are the only surviving Fire Mage, I think the Water Mages will not be that offended if I tell them that I accidentally drowned the book in the lake».
He held it out to the mage, and sighed playfully.
«Ah, how can I be such a clumsy bastard? There it goes. Such a pity»
Milten picked up the book from his friends palm - and softly smiled for some reason.
The book fit almost perfectly into the mage's narrow but long palm, and it took him only a few pages to realize that the book was really, really valuable - not so much without the stones, that were used to make the Barrier, but still. The Rogue would be reprimanded harshly in the New Camp if he returned without it.
As he was about to return the book, he was struck by a strange... gentle smile, which his nameless friend was for some reason saving only for him, with a slight wink.
And also, wait... useless for their freedom?
His friends looked up at the moon that was setting over the horizon and said, not looking at the mage, but in a way that made his heart skip a beat:
«Keep it as a souvenir, and don't fill your pretty head with all that useless stuff. Xardas has a plan, that's why he needs me. We'll be free - not now, there's a lot of stuff to be done, but we will. Try not to be too close to the camps when the Barrier collapses. They will quickly become anarchic...»
«You sound so confident, as if you really hope to break it,» the mage arched an eyebrow. However, Milten felt that the rogue would not throw words into the wind - he never did, not with him. And that it was time to pick up a newer robe, if possible, so that he would not be ashamed to show himself in front of the fire mages of other lands:
«I'm going to. Whatever happens to the barrier, and whatever happens to me, take care. I will go to the plane of undead myself and kick you're ass back to living if you fuck up and die before we all free»
«Oh... I think, it's mutual»
The rogue grinned, and the second later - stepped into the darkness, so quickly that Milten didn't even have time to notice which way he went. He left just as he had come into the mage's life - abruptly, without even an attempt to ask permission or to have any semblance of decency.
With the almanac in his arms, Milten looked up at the horizon, where a slightly pinkening in the sky was beginning to show. The night was almost over. Perhaps their imprisonment was, too.
«Should warn Diego...» he whispered to himself, getting up from the ground and gathering his belongings into a camping bag.
A couple days later - the barrier, indeed, had fallen.
And Milten kept his friend's last chuckle as he dissolved into thin air with the magic of the teleportation rune. The Water Mages were angry, mad - but there was nothing they could do. Not when everything around them crumbled into dust soon enough.
Along with his friend, who was gone - as Diego said, shaking his head sullenly, «That temple is nothing more than a ruin, covered over by rampaging orcs. Nothing even remotely human could have survived there».
Perhaps it wasn't so bad under the Barrier, Milten thought grimly and hypocritically.
He missed him - more, than he'll be ever able to say.