Chapter Text
Well met my friend!
Bonjour mon petite ami!
Have you come to refresh your joy again?
Non monsieur.
I have come to tell you...
That I am open to finding it again...
Chapter 1
Vigilant sat still for a long while, a silent sentinel beside the smouldering pyre where Flick’s stardust had danced its last. The flames had faded now, but the scent of burnt silk and candy lingered on the wind, clinging to memory. His gaze swept slowly across the camp, taking in the weary shapes left behind in the wake of too many goodbyes.
Balric sat by the fire, his sharp features caught in the dying glow. He stared into the embers, as if scrying answers from the ash. There was no confusion in his gaze, not even a flicker of concern at Vigilant’s changed form. The elven warrior had accepted it all with the quiet certainty of a man who knew better than to chase shadows. But something else stirred behind his eyes, something weighty. Still, Vigilant judged him to be the strongest of the party just now. Balric would need less of his light than the others. At least for the moment.
Vigilant’s eyes moved past him, skimming the outline of sleeping forms. Rowan lay curled in her bedroll, the firelight casting long shadows over her young face. Even in rest, her brow was furrowed, her lips drawn tight. Her eyes moved beneath the lids as if chasing or fleeing something far beyond the reach of dreams.
A child still, in many ways. A powerful one, yes, but far too young to carry so many burdens. She would need his joy. She would need it like a lantern in the dark.
Then there was Glansmudock, their compact form barely noticeable beneath the heap of blanket and cloak. The rock gnome lay so still it almost pained Vigilant to look. Smallest among them, yes but they had expressed such fierce joy once, such fire. Now grief had tucked itself into their shoulders, made a home there. Flick’s passing had robbed something from them, something no words could return.
Glansmudock would be difficult. They did not show sorrow the way others did. Only in extremes did their soul break through the stone skin of restraint. But Vigilant knew what he owed their lost friend. He would find a way. Somehow, he would reach them.
At last, he let his gaze drift to her.
Artemisia.
He breathed her name only in thought, as if saying it aloud might unravel the fragile threads holding him together.
She sat away from the others, half-wreathed in shadow, half-lit by the fire’s dying gold. Her fingers moved with a strange urgency, her wrist flexing side to side behind the open face of her journal. The lines of her body were tight, coiled like a drawn bowstring. Her face wore the mask she’d built for herself, composed, unreadable but he had seen the pain leak out from the cracks before. He could feel it now, like frost crawling down his spine.
Was she sketching?
No… the way her hand moved. That was not the dance of lines across a figure. That was the rhythm of writing.
His heart tugged at the thought. There was power in words, in laying your wounds bare on parchment. It was something he understood far too well. The darkest pain, given form and trapped in ink, could sometimes be carried more easily.
She was writing to survive.
He watched her in silence for a few moments longer, letting the fire’s warmth press gently into his side. Every line of her posture spoke of tension, of something barely held at bay. What she had done… what she had needed to do… it lingered around her like smoke that would not clear.
And yet, he smiled.
Not for her pain. Never that.
He smiled because she was still here. Because despite everything, she endured. Because Flick had taught him that a smile was a gift you gave to the world, and perhaps most importantly, to those who needed it most. A small defiance against despair.
But deeper still… he smiled because of her.
In his mind’s eye, the memories came unbidden but welcome, an array of perfect illusions cast like candlelight in a dream. Their first meeting flickered across his thoughts. Her eyes, cold and searching, wary behind the veil of control she wore like armour. He remembered how those eyes had softened, warmed, if only a little, as they travelled side by side. How her beauty deepened with each glance laced with concern, how strength and stoicism had been the foundation of the strange familiarity that bloomed between them.
He did not know when his heart had opened and let her in. Whether it had been a single moment; some silent exchange, a glance held too long, or whether it was something older and slower. A seed buried deep that had grown in the warmth of her presence. That part didn’t matter.
Love… At least it is for me...
He almost chuckled aloud at the thought, a gentle sound that never left his lips. A warmth stirred in his chest, the way a hearth fire stirs embers to life with the promise of more. He could feel it now, alien and familiar, like the echo of lives not his own drifting through the tide of memory. The other variants. Their thoughts. Their hearts. Their love. His love. It was all overlapping now, like a collage of affection and fragments of time. Each version of himself had seen her through different eyes, but they had all felt the same pull.
They… we… I… had all loved… love her.
Bittersweet, he thought. A joke the gods themselves might laugh at in cruel delight. He had found his joy here, in the shadows, in this cold land wrapped in death and sorrow. And in the centre of it, her. She belonged here. Not entirely, perhaps but something in her did. She had chosen this place, and part of her, he suspected, felt at home in it.
That was why it mattered. That was why he would stay.
He remembered a promise. An oath, spoken with the quiet conviction of the soul. A vow not just to protect her, but to stand beside her. Each version of him had felt it, some had spoken the words aloud. Some had whispered them to the dark. But they had all meant them, and they had all come from the same place.
A place of love.
But he said nothing.
Her mask was well-crafted. Her walls; centuries old perhaps, fortified by pain and necessity. Trying to peer through them would serve only selfish purpose, and love, true love, asked for nothing in return. There were no demands in his heart, no hidden ledgers waiting to be balanced.
It was enough that he felt it.
It would be enough that she survived, that she carried on. That would be his joy now, seeing her live, even if it was not with him.
Now we have a choice though...
His silver gaze drifted toward the horizon, a breath escaping him in silence as his mind turned to the road ahead. The fire was low now, the stars hidden behind a sullen canopy of cloud. And the dark lands before them waited, patient and cruel.
But Vigilant smiled, because hope; like love, required no permission.
“So, mes amis, we have a choice to make, non?” Vigilant stirred the silence with the gentle murmur of his voice, smooth and laced warmth.
He looked toward Balric, hoping for an anchor, though out the corner of his eye he caught Artemisia lift her head, words breaking the hush like a stone tossed into still water.
“We can take the road that leads back,” he continued, eyes scanning the tree-line where the mists hung heavy like a breath unshed, “or there is this road that leads further into these lands… into the mist…” A smile curled on his lips as he turned back to Balric. “Or… we could spend more time in the forest? You seem more at home here than you did in ze house?”
Balric tilted his head, scanning the looming black branches of the gnarled trees that creaked like old bones in the wind.
“Well yes, I am normally,” he said slowly, eyes narrowing with wariness. “This is a particularly strange forest, but not too dissimilar to ones I’ve been in before.” He glanced back at the dying fire, lost for a moment in its flicker and pop. When his gaze returned to Vigilant, it was thoughtful, shaded.
“The forest hasn’t really treated us well so far… though neither have any buildings we’ve gone into… so we are stuck between a rock and a hard place.” He gave a resigned shrug, his confidence tempered by the scars of too many wrong turns. Vigilant nodded with a soft chuckle.
“Well this house…” he gestured behind them, to where its malevolence had bled out and settled into memory. His smile was light, designed to ease, to suppress the coiling grief. “Though magical, surely it is not alone in these lands? It looks like it should be accompanied by other dwellings. If we carry on, surely we should find shelter, other people… if anyone is actually alive in this place, non?”
Balric gave a quiet nod, his silence saying more than words. Vigilant turned his smile on Artemisia, his voice gentle now.
“What say you, Artemisia?” Her head lifted, and there was surprise in her eyes, as if the very act of being asked had disarmed her. She blinked as though waking from somewhere deeper than sleep.
“Oh… ummm… whatever you think is a good idea…” she said, eyes uncertain. “Shelter sounds good, and a village might have people that would know things useful to us.”
Vigilant watched her carefully, the joy in him quieting, not fading, only gentling. Her discomfort was small but visible, like a crack in porcelain, and so he softened the brightness in his grin, just enough not to blind.
“I believe you are… agreeing with me?” The smile turned sly at the edges, teasing in its gentleness.
“I suppose yes, I am agreeing with you,” she said with a roll of her eyes, the faintest ghost of warmth behind the gesture, her mask settling back into place like a familiar blade sliding into its sheath. She was reading him. Trying to understand what had changed.
Vigilant gave a theatrical nod.
“Ah, d’accord! So… when everyone is rested, we will continue on! The road must lead somewhere…”
But as his voice trailed off, so too did the brightness in his gaze. His eyes turned to the pyre; now little more than smouldering embers beneath the soft rain, and for a moment the smile strained, held like a soldier holding a line alone.
“Now though… I will gather what remains of our friend,” he said quietly. “The fire should have died down enough by now…”
He rose from the log with graceful ease, his movements fluid, composed. From his pack, he pulled a worn leather pouch, shaking loose the rations inside and slipping them back into his satchel. Then, with a reverence that spoke of deep and unwavering love, he began to move the hottest logs away from the pyre’s centre, hands careful not to disturb the delicate difference between grey ash and sacred remains.
Flick's ashes shimmered in the dim light, rainbow fragments caught in the embers, like stars waiting to be wished upon.
“I will get you home, mon petit ami,” he whispered, voice soft as falling leaves.
The pouch was sealed and placed inside his armour, close to his heart.
A book snapped shut behind him, sharp and final. He turned to see Artemisia rising. The walls had returned. The mask was in place. She had stepped away again, away from him, away from all of them. But Vigilant understood. Some wounds needed solitude to stop bleeding.
“Then for this evening, I need to sleep, so…” she said, voice cool, remote, though not unkind. She nodded to them both, already drifting back into herself like a shadow into dusk.
Artemisia spoke first, “Have a…”
“Can I not…” Vigilant began at the same time, their words stumbling over each other like misstepped dancers.
She tilted her head, curiosity dancing in her pale eyes. So he continued, more gently, “See? Your drawing?”
“Oh, yes.” Artemisia reopened her journal, her fingers lingering a moment longer than necessary at the spine. This time, however, she didn’t pass it to him as she had done before. Instead, she laid one slender hand across the left-hand page, shielding it from view as she turned the book and held it out. Vigilant glimpsed faint trails of script sneaking out from beneath her palm; words half-hidden like secrets whispered in a storm, but he didn’t try to read them. He wouldn't trespass there. Instead, he let his gaze fall to the right-hand page.
And there he found himself.
His smile widened, unbidden.
She had made him beautiful.
Not just in the soft rendering of his rose-hued skin or the precise play of colour in his hair, strands of rainbow ink catching even the meagre firelight, but in the kindness she had allowed to settle on his features. There was a lazy grin there, yes, but it carried no mockery. It was warmth, comfort, the expression he’d always hoped others saw when he smiled at them. But it was the eyes that truly caught him. They were his, yes, but they echoed hers. Like quicksilver mirrors, full of soul and sorrow and something unsaid.
“You have captured the uh, butterflies?” he asked, gesturing gently toward the sketch. The little illusions hovered about his real head now, vibrant and swirling, yet strange to see them here rendered still.
“Pretty,” she said. “They’re um… they remind me of Flick.” The words were quiet, cracked at the edges. A shadow passed through her eyes; gone quickly, but not before he saw it.
“Oui! He also thought so.” Vigilant lifted a hand, fingers passing through the hovering illusions. They dispersed at his touch like coloured smoke in wind. “A long time ago when we first met.”
“You met the other day.” Her gaze sharpened on him, puzzled. “You didn’t look like this then. I…”
“Ah! Non, erm… my uh, others? Had not met Flick.” He smiled, letting his accent curl around the words. “I have frequented the Witchlight and we met on many occasions. Flick helped me to refresh my joy.”
The smile on his lips held firm, but it fought against the weight behind it. Already he missed the little Fey’s presence, like losing the sound of a favourite song.
“I think he helped everyone in that manner…” Artemisia’s voice turned softer, further away. She stared into the blackened remnants of the pyre, now damp and hissing in the rain. “That’s good… And I suppose it’s nice to have a reminder… to some extent.”
He watched her, noting how she turned inward, as if questioning which memory of Flick would serve her best: the laughter or the last look.
“Then hold onto it, mademoiselle,” he said, not quite a whisper, but quieter than the wind. Let it be the laughter, he thought. Please, let it be the joy.
“I will try to.” She paused, her eyes flicking back to him, unreadable again. “Well, goodnight Balric. Goodnight V.”
“Goodnight Artemisia.” His voice followed her as she stepped away into the misting dark. The smile returned to his lips; of course it did, but it faltered at the edges, shy of the eyes.
He watched her go, and the ache in his chest was a soft, familiar thing. A song without words. He knew better than to chase it. Now was not the time. So instead, he turned toward the fire and the one companion who remained.
With a practiced grace, he lowered himself onto the log beside Balric.
“So Balric, Druidry?”
The Elf blinked, caught mid-thought. “Yes um, what would you like to know?”
“Everything, mon ami!”
And so, beneath the cold trees and the weeping sky, Vigilant learned. He soaked in every word Balric offered; of sacred groves and seasonal tides, of roots that healed and leaves that sang. At first, the druid spoke haltingly, unsure if the Tiefling’s curiosity was more politeness than passion. But as the questions kept coming, insightful and unrelenting, Balric began to share more freely. Vigilant listened like a man offered sunlight in winter, his smile ever bright, his mind drinking deep.
For a time, the night was kind to them.
But even as he laughed and asked, as he nodded and smiled, Vigilant’s mind spun beneath it all, a quiet millwheel ever turning.
There was something he had missed before. A thread that now seemed obvious, even foolish to have ignored.
The nursemaid’s room…
Being caught unawares by the Grick…
And now sleeping; truly sleeping, here amidst shadows and rot…
His eyes narrowed slightly as he gazed into the dying firelight.
What need would an Elf have for sleep?
And what dreams, then, might haunt her?
************************
Morning crept upon them like a thief, careful in its approach but relentless in its intent. There was no soft dawn or golden hour, just a sudden shift in light, dulled and choked beneath a ceiling of thick, unmoving cloud that pressed against the heavens like a slate lid. Somewhere above, the sun clawed its way into the sky, a struggling eye behind smoked glass. The world did not brighten so much as it changed, mist glowed faintly silver, the bark of trees took on the pallor of ash, and the distant groans and creaks of forest life stirred the hush with subtle menace. Overhead, a swirling unkindness of ravens burst skyward, black wings catching what light there was, their cries sharp as broken promises.
Artemisia rose from her bedroll as easily as if she'd merely blinked herself upright. She stretched, long-limbed and regal even in rest's afterglow, her hair like flame, catching what little light there was. She turned her gaze upward, brow furrowed faintly, trying to locate the source of the pale glow above.
“So there is a Sun here?”
Vigilant glanced toward her, the words pulling his attention and with it, his breath. In the muted dawnlight, she looked more spirit than flesh; ethereal, wild, dangerous. But it wasn’t just that. Something new caught his eye, something impossible to miss now that he saw it.
Just above the neckline of her tunic, nestled at the centre of her chest, was a mark he hadn't seen before. A perfect New Moon, dark and blood-red, as though painted upon her with a meticulous hand and a dreadful kind of reverence. The detail was exquisite, uncanny in its precision. At one edge, the faintest sliver of silver caught the light, the only indication that the moon was not wholly lost. It was as if the pendant he had once given her had sunk into her skin and left this… echo. This brand.
He felt something stir in him, not fear, not yet, but curiosity laced with awe. The mark suited her in a way he couldn’t explain, dangerous and beautiful. His fingers itched to reach for it, to trace its edges, to ask. But he smiled instead, quietly filing it away for questioning later.
“At least I assume that’s the sun... it’s been a while.”
Vigilant turned fully toward her, brushing the damp from his gloves as he stretched. The sleep had done little to touch the weariness in his bones, but the sight of her, hair tousled by sleep, silver eyes squinting upward, brought its own strange warmth. He tried to remember the last time he had seen the sun, truly seen it, felt its heat on his skin, basked beneath it without the press of danger or the weight of death, but the memories slid like oil through his thoughts.
“It fits though, oui? All the darkness, the mist... the vibe of this land?”
“Yes... I was beginning to think there was not such a thing as day in this place.”
“If you can call it that...” he murmured, casting his gaze about the fog-drenched trees. The light here didn’t so much illuminate as it revealed how little of the forest wanted to be seen.
“Hmmm... so where are we headed? Which way?”
Vigilant tilted his head toward the thinning mist ahead, the path snaking westward through the trees. Others had begun to stir and move, gathering packs and tightening belts.
“The west path is the clearest,” he offered, gesturing with a half-smile. “What say the rest of you?”
“I would agree. If it’s clearest then perhaps that means there is some sort of settlement nearby,” Rowan said, her voice lined with the strain of recent grief, the fear not yet washed clean by rest. “I say west.”
“I’d rather the clearest path,” Glansmudock muttered, hoisting their bag with a grimace. “I cannot be fucked trying to get through these trees!”
Vigilant noted the slump in their shoulders, the way their eyes flicked dully from shadow to shadow. Though they’d slept the whole night through, they looked no more rested than before. Weary in soul. They all were. They needed a victory, something to anchor them.
He smiled, full of the warmth he knew they needed to feel from someone, anyone.
“Well, if everyone is ready? Shall we go?”
“No time like the present,” Glansmudock grunted, adjusting their gear with mechanical efficiency.
As nods circled the group, Vigilant raised his hands and cast a quiet pulse of Thaumaturgy, sending a handful of cheerful notes jingling into the air around them like music boxes springing to life in celebration. But as the last notes faded into the trees, the party stood frozen, faces turned to him in a confused silence. Fear flickered in the air like static.
“Why did you do that?” Rowan’s voice shook despite her composure.
“We are embarking on a great adventure,” he offered, still smiling, “it needs a, uh... accompaniment?”
“Yes, but maybe we could hold off until we get to the settlement? If we can hear it then perhaps other things can as well?” She cast her gaze across the trees as though expecting fangs and claws to emerge from the shadows. “We don’t know what lives in here...”
“My apologies, ma sœur. Rowan... I apologise.” He gave her a soft, understanding smile, voice gentler now. “I was trying to lighten the mood. Remember though... Flick would have appreciated it.”
Rowan held his gaze a moment longer. A hint of a smile tugged at her lips, brief and uncertain, before vanishing like mist beneath a breeze. She looked away, shoulders curling forward as she fell back to the rear of the group.
“You are right... I’m sorry... I just...” she murmured, trailing off into silence.
Vigilant winced inwardly.
Too soon, idiot. Too soon...
He should have known, should have felt the ache still raw in the air. A few hours was no salve for loss, not in a place like this. Now Rowan was further from him than before, her trust fraying at the edge, and the others wore the same hesitancy on their faces, carefully avoiding his eyes as they began to move forward, save for one.
Artemisia.
Her gaze found him for a moment, cool and unreadable, but it stung more than it should have. A mask, he knew, but one that revealed as much as it hid. He turned back to the path ahead, lips still curved in that unfailing smile, though it had lost its ease.
Tough crowd...
But he would win them back. He always did. This was not a performance for his own sake, it never had been. He carried their hope because someone had to. And if they could not yet lift their eyes to the horizon, then he would walk beside them until they could.
Let the road do its worst. He would meet it with a grin.
****************
The road, such as it was, did indeed endeavour to do its worst.
The forest pressed in like a closing hand. Gnarled branches leaned low across the thin, winding trail. Damp air clung to the travellers like cobwebs, and each footfall stirred the mist rather than disturbed it. Behind them, the world vanished in fog; ahead, only the promise of more of the same. Forward was the only truth the land allowed.
Vigilant walked at the front, smile fixed like armour. It had been tested now more times than he could count, pulled taut by rain and silence and the weight of grief hanging over the group like a burial shroud. He didn’t try to cheer them, not now. He saved his breath for watching the trees, for scanning the forest floor, for listening to the wind as if it might carry warning. His eyes worked, but he trusted them less than he once had. The mist lied.
When the skies broke open and the rain came, it came with the dispassionate cruelty of a world that had forgotten mercy. They were soaked in seconds, each droplet hammering down as if the clouds above sought to wash them clean of whatever sins had brought them here.
Balric, ever the silent hunter, turned his head from side to side as they walked, expression carved from stone.
“There are all manner of creatures about, so keep a sharp eye out,” the elf said quietly, though his voice carried. His gaze didn’t scan the path like a man watching for danger; it reached, listening. “Wolves, bears... an elk, I think.”
He paused mid-stride. His eyes narrowed. The party halted behind him.
“I heard trees... or branches snapping and falling. Like something big was out there pushing them over... can we stop a moment?”
Vigilant followed Balric’s gaze and took a step forward, blinking into the thick gloom. For a moment, the mist parted, just enough to reveal the way ahead. A clearing beckoned, not far now. He offered Balric a smile, though there was steel beneath it.
“There’s a clearing up ahead. We can rest there.”
The promise of even a moment’s reprieve lent the group enough energy to push on. The trees began to space wider apart, and the wet earth sloped gently downward toward a break in the woods. When they stepped into it, the clearing felt like the sigh of a long-held breath.
To the left, grass heavy with rain bent toward the earth, leading down a shallow incline. At its base flowed a river, dark and lazy beneath the gloom, its current too subtle to speak loudly. The forest around it was quieter here but not still. Always alive. Always watching.
Near the bank, a rotting wooden post held a mouldering plank, just upright enough to bear a name: River Ivlis, painted in letters that time and weather had all but devoured.
Vigilant wandered down to the water’s edge, boots squelching softly in the sodden earth. He followed the river’s course for as long as he could, hoping it might guide them toward something; anything, alive. But the mist rose again, greedy and thick, stealing distance as surely as it had before. The river vanished into it like everything else.
When he returned, most of the party were resting, grateful for the short pause. But two had chosen action over ease.
Balric and Glansmudock worked with quiet focus. Vigilant watched them both for a while before the elf's spell flared to life. The familiar glow of conjuration lit the clearing for a moment, but what it birthed from the weave was not the comfort of a companion.
The bird that emerged from the light was a raven, yes, but wrong. Where Balric’s prior familiars had been flawlessly formed, creatures of night or cave rendered with exquisite precision, this one was something else entirely. Its feathers were frayed, some white, others blue with a sickly pallor. It looked half-rotted, as though it had clawed its way from a tomb rather than flown from the weave.
Something about it unsettled the air. Something ancient. Something broken.
Vigilant tilted his head at the thing Balric had summoned, if it could still be called a raven. The feathers were ragged, more rot than plumage, like smoke and ash had dressed its wings in ruin. His voice was casual, but there was steel beneath it.
“Balric... did you mean for it to look like that?” He needed to gauge how disconcerted he ought to be about Balric’s state of mind.
“Ummm no... it certainly wasn't intentional...” Balric's tone was distant, his gaze rising. Vigilant followed it, eyes scanning the canopy above where ravens wheeled in quiet arcs. Those in the sky were untouched by whatever curse haunted the ground, they looked normal. Healthy. The contrast was unsettling.
“Something is altering the magic...” Balric murmured.
Something clicked in Vigilant’s mind. A puzzle piece locked into place, distant memory becoming present insight.
“Perhaps then it was not Flick's mood that affected him...” he said, more to himself than the others, but still loud enough for Balric to frown.
Balric turned to him with a puzzled look, but Vigilant had already shifted his focus, locking eyes with Artemisia. The threads of memory wove tighter.
“You remember in the catacombs, Flick cast Mage Hand? And it appeared as a skeletal ‘and, then a zombie ‘and?”
Recognition passed across Artemisia’s face, brief, clouded, but Balric gave a slow nod.
“Yes...”
It was Glansmudock who caught on first. They lifted their head from the tangle of their spellwork.
“It’s just an effect of this place, you mean?”
“Oui!” Vigilant’s voice was warm, almost delighted. “The land we are in... perhaps it is changing your magics?”
Balric looked down again at the ruined raven, which returned his gaze with uncanny calm.
“Yes, I think so. It is certainly... intriguing, that it would have such an effect on vastly different forms of magic.”
“Or exciting?” Vigilant grinned, eyes alight. “Think what might ‘appen with other spells we cast? Perhaps there will be some other strange effects. I wonder what a fireball might look like? Perhaps it will be ice?”
He turned to them all, his grin wide and hopeful, but the mood did not catch. A few weak smiles flickered, but the road had wearied them. Glansmudock didn’t respond at all. They muttered under their breath, tugging their fingers apart before sucking on a finger as if pricked. Then, with a soft grunt of success, they held up a small metallic object, palm cupping it like a gift to the world.
A dense little orb, no larger than a coin, but packed with tight cogs, wheels, and intricate craftsmanship. It was like a miniature version of the AOU that had brought Vigilant here.
Vigilant arched a brow, eyes twinkling.
“Glansmudock, mon ami... have you built a grenade?”
The object begged to be thrown. The tension in it was palpable.
“I wouldn’t call it a grenade...” Glansmudock answered matter-of-factly. “I would call it a miniature distraction device.”
“Ahhh, a uh... flashbang?”
“A what?”
That was Artemisia, her voice curious. But before Vigilant could explain, Glansmudock offered him a sly, conspiratorial smile.
“You know what? I like that! Yeah!”
Vigilant laughed and began to clap, loud and unabashed in his admiration. Glansmudock immediately tilted their head, expression one of mock censure, like a parent catching a child cheering in a library.
“We might need to have a word about your noise levels...” they said, though the warmth in their voice dulled any sting.
Vigilant’s clapping slowed, sheepish. He glanced around at the still, brooding trees. The sound had echoed louder than he’d intended.
“Ah, pardonne-moi.” He nodded to them all in apology, then turned back to Glansmudock with genuine admiration. “You are full of surprises, Glansmudock.”
“I have picked up a thing or two.”
“Anyone else?”
But none had the chance to answer.
The wind came alive.
A roar rolled through the forest, low and thunderous, like some ancient beast remembering its own voice. It struck the trees in all directions at once, bouncing between trunks, made strange and sourceless by the mist. Every head snapped around, eyes wide and searching.
“What was that?” Glansmudock whispered.
“Definitely not who I was asking...” Vigilant murmured, his rifle already in his hands, his stance fluid and alert. The mist made it impossible to tell which direction the sound had come from, which way to run, or shoot.
“I hope that miniature distraction device is good?” Artemisia’s voice was tight, measured. Not quite afraid. But close.
“Perhaps we should be moving on?”
“Perhaps,” she agreed, “and carry on quietly.”
Her eyes cut to him with pointed precision. Vigilant gave her a grin in reply, part charm, part guilt, and nodded, shouldering the rifle. She gestured to it.
“A last resort? Yes?”
He said nothing, only nodded again. Then, with a flick of his fingers, he cast Thaumaturgy. The air beside Artemisia shifted, just enough. A whisper tickled her ear in his smooth accented voice:
“Oui!”
She almost seemed to smile, despite herself.
They rejoined the path together, stepping softly back into the fog. The world was waiting for them. And whatever had roared, whatever ancient thing stirred out there in the trees, it was waiting too.