Chapter Four: A Poisonous Ally
A/N: This story, since it's basically one character rattling on and on about almost nothing, is very easy to write, as well as being funny. I'm glad that Oceanus is so sarcastic. It makes everyone else look like an optimist. Or a saint.
The title refers to Oceanus's personality at this point, by the way. Also, you'll notice that his tone changes a little in this chapter.
More character profiles:
Guinevere: Mentioned in Roy's profile on SSB:M, Guinevere is the princess of Bern, the militaristic head of the entire continent. At the end of FE6, she becomes Queen after her brother, the former King Zephiel, dies at Roy's hands. She can be seen over the course of FE7 as a child, during the death of her father at her brother's blade.
Mildain: Prince of Etruria. One day, he was nearly assassinated by traitors who wished to weaken the country. After his 'death', his father fell into a deep depression and performed as a puppet on strings to his chief advisor's whims. It is unknown at the end of the game if Mildain and his father ever meet again formally, but in this story he has inherited the throne after his father's death.
Ilia: A snowy wasteland where the people's only option for income is to hire out their fighters as famously loyal mercenaries. Even after Lord Hector's death, the Ilian mercenaries he had hired beforehand refused to defect to Bern's side. In my story, Oceanus's father, Sinya, was born there.
Western Isles: A region off the coast of Elibe that was plagued by pirates under the control of a select few corrupt Etrutrian lords. This area is rich in minerals, and the people there live in constant fear of being kidnapped to work there until they die. Roy stopped this system during the latter half of FE6. Immersa, Oceanus's mother, was born here.
Numerous other nations such as Ostia and Sacae exist, but they do not play a major part in Oceanus's story.
During the course of FE7 (my version, only linkable to this story), Immersa and Sinya sided with Eliwood. They, moreover, were faithful soldiers of Roy's when he was forced to play his part in FE6, and were some of the only members of their kind who fought at all. They also knew Ninian, but weren't present when she died.
Oceanus says he's 16, but he's lying. XD
Dear Journal,
I have come to one inescapable conclusion.
Mankind is a species full of imbeciles. I know that they can't transform to escape capture, nor can they live as long as my kind do, but come on! A net, of all things…
Perhaps I ought to start from the beginning.
The four of us (or six if you counted Kree and Filli) were walking off and out of Thaegan's territory. Technically, it wasn't really hers anymore since she was dead and all. Eventually, Jasmine and I felt like our group was being followed, so she put her ear to a tree and I cocked my head and added some magic.
I'm not the best in the world at manipulating raw magic like that, but I'm not a spellcaster for nothing. I wasn't going to be outdone by an Amazon, after all.
There were several things following us, for sure. I didn't know quite how many, but I could tell a wolf howl from a demon snarl. This was evidence of the latter.
I didn't bother explaining how I knew what I did, but I did tell them what I'd found. Jasmine confirmed the group tracking us, and also specified that there were eleven. For some reason, I felt like, at that point, I should have cared about this little detail. Like all little voices in the back of one's head, they are all too easy to ignore. I did so.
The others knew that outrunning wolves was like saying that the sun wouldn't rise – it just wasn't going to happen. Jasmine might have climbed the trees, but I had never been in a forest beyond the light ones in Elibe that were barely a mile in any direction. Hence, my lack of ability to climb trees with any semblance of stealth, grace, or speed. It was a wonder I hadn't been eaten back in the Forests of Silence.
Oh, wait. If I had been eaten, I might have transformed, and something would have exploded. Never mind.
It was just this sort of thinking that got me into trouble, just like my dim-witted companions.
The wolves had shown up by then – they were all sorts of colors from yellow with spots to red, big, and hairy. They all had black mouths, and were larger than normal wolves. For a size comparison, get a good look at a cow.
Every time we stepped back, the wolves took a step forwards. I did a quick head count and saw that there were indeed eleven of them. I was pretty sure that that number was really important by that point, but, as always, I was too focused on the present to think about the future.
We took one more collective step backwards and suddenly the ground was a lot farther away. We'd been caught in a net, of all things.
Oh, now they're laughing at me. How very funny. Too bad I can't fry them with some spell. Blasted recoil.
I ended up with Barda (the big oaf) sitting on my stomach and Lief's elbow on my jugular. And they expected me to do something?! As if. I could have, again, transformed, but something besides the enemy might have died. Us, for example.
As we were adjusting to our new accommodations, the eleven wolves transformed into eleven fiends. There was one big, red one, along with several sets of U-G-L-Y twins and a couple that didn't look to resemble anything I'd ever seen before. Lief mentioned the thirteen children of Thaegan, of which eleven remained. I guess we shouldn't have killed the witch or those freaks a week back…
The monsters started chanting that 'Fresh meat soon' thing over and over, just like Jin and Jod had. They built a fire under the four of us, and started arguing over who got to eat what. Apparently, Ichabod, the big, ugly one, wanted two legs and a head.
Recounting them, Lief must have noticed that two of the monsters were protesting about equal shares. While four is actually a pretty easy number to divide by, there were eleven of them. Lief noted this, at the top of his lungs. Barda followed suit while I was choking and Jasmine said something very rude at both of them.
Now, Filli, Jasmine's little rat/squirrel/chipmunk is a lot smarter than we give him credit for. He slipped out of the net, nibbled a giant-sized hole in the net, and we got away while the monsters started beating the crap out of each other for the right to eat us. Jasmine knocked Ichabod into the fire as were high-tailed it out of there.
The other three flopped down in the ground as soon as we ran past the border of Thaegan's territory, asleep as soon as they hit the grass. And when I finish up my self-narration, I think I'll be joining them.
- Oceanus
Dear Journal,
My friends are morons. It's not like they knew before they bought the beasts how dangerous they were, but rather they're stupid because they refuse to listen to me. I have a copy of several books on Deltoran history, along with a bestiary field guide, a cliff notes version of the Deltoran Annals…you name it, and I have it.
I even have topography maps. I probably could have done with those before I went out on this crazy adventure. I mean, I had them, I just forgot about it.
Anyway, the four of us finally decided to return to the land of the living and start looking for Tom's shop, which I forgot to mention last time.
Tom's an older guy, who runs a shop that just buzzes with magic. Some things, like the self-coiling rope and the pipe that blew glowing bubbles, were very interesting and made me wonder if I could get one back home. However, I wasn't so in love with the fire beads.
Lief and Barda, as it happens, are as good as broke. I know they're out of money, since I watched them spend it all on stuff like cushioned socks and those instant-bread things. The idiots never once asked me to foot the bill, which I could have done quite easily. It's not like I actually have much of a hoard back home, but I did have the forethought to bring some of my small fortune with me.
I guess that's the thing with me. Unless you ask, I'll never tell.
However sadistically amused I may have been at their money troubles, even I had to draw the line when they bought the muddlets.
Muddlets are three-legged beasts, about the size of horses. They have wedge-shaped heads and long, floppy ears. Most of them have varying amounts of spots on them, and those aren't limited to the usual horse tones. I saw one with blue spots once, but that isn't really important. Anyway, muddlets have one really thick leg in front and two smaller ones in back, and their bodies are about as wide around as the average barrel with their rears even larger.
Besides, muddlets are known for being abnormally focused on two things – their home field and rotting apples. Upon getting a whiff of either, they'll bolt and go after it, sometimes dragging themselves through quicksand, fogs, forests, you name it. And supposedly, they'll bolt upon the seeing any small, furry animal. Considering that they used to live on the plain where the City of the Rats stands, I guess it isn't surprising.
If you're wondering how I know this, I have a scroll called Monsters of Deltora. If it's accurate, I guess I'll be very busy when it comes to the later days of our adventure.
- Oceanus
Oceanus closed his journal with a none-too-subtle grumble. It wasn't his fault that the other three were so set on using muddlets. Having traveled everywhere either on foot or by flight, this riding business was a foreign concept. He just wasn't comfortable, and the information in his head wasn't at all reassuring.
Besides, unless he felt like sharing Noodle with Lief, he was going to have to walk in any case. Just one look at the beasts told him that they could outstrip him easily.
Perhaps he would have protested against the purchase of the muddlets, but his companions either trusted their own judgment or just didn't care for his. Oceanus suspected it was a bit of both. If they went ahead, it was unlikely that he'd ever be able to catch up.
Despite that, he had a map of his own that gave him a pretty good idea what they would do. It was a road map, therefore useless for his friends, who had planned to be trekking through wilderness for a majority of their journey. Along the road Tom's shop was located; there was a fork in the path. It was about an hour's travel away, if the muddlets moved approximately as fast as horses.
One road led to Miller's Rise, a longer route to the Broad River. The other was shorter, but had the ominous city of Noradz exactly on the road, close to the river. If he were to guess, Oceanus was almost positive that Lief, Barda, and Jasmine would take the shorter road.
Gritting his teeth at his own vow of silence, Oceanus cursed whatever gods had struck humankind with the plague of foolishness. There were too many unknown factors, but it seemed as if, for now, the young mage would have to stay his hand for a time. If the Shadow Lord, the lords back home, and the people of Deltora could be patient, so could he.
He bit his lip, feeling the first stirrings of worry. He only hoped it wouldn't be too long.
Several days after his friends left to go to the City of Rats (they had asked him to come, but he had refused and they hadn't understood why); Oceanus was sitting on the railing of Tom's paddock. The three gray horses still stood behind their fence, and seemed to be getting restless.
In the early morning, an entire pod of Gray Guards had appeared. They paid the mage no heed, since they had obviously come a long way and his appearance was now more unremarkable than it had been – dark brown hair, with flat, green eyes. His skin tone hadn't changed, but he did look a lot more bored than he had when his friends had left without him.
Though Tom had regarded him with detached interest, Oceanus had neither asked for the shopkeeper's charity nor did he get it. Over the last days he had simply waited, not even bothering to eat anything substantial, as he had little need to do so. As his father had said once, the difference between what one needs to eat and what can eat is vast.
Despite all the powers he had gained, Oceanus did not have the gift of prophecy. As such, he was pleasantly surprised when his companions tumbled out of carts driven by three Ra-Kachars. The red-clothed people had only spared him a glance, clearly as uninterested as the Guards had been, so his appearance had been overlooked by them.
His friends did no such thing.
First, they had demanded why he had stayed behind. Oceanus told them with some relief, but not without scolding all three for their lack of judgment upon hearing their story.
"Next time, follow an ally's advice, would you?" Oceanus finished, thoroughly exasperated. His mild annoyance gave no hint of the inner rage at their foolishness, and he preferred to keep it that way.
Tom appeared, and the other three jumped on him with accusations. Oceanus didn't particularly care – he may not have been the wisest of his closest friends (not Lief, Jasmine, or Barda, but the other two), but he could recognize a person whose desire to live overshadowed all else.
"Leave him alone," the mage said waspishly. "There are never going to be that many people who are willing to sacrifice themselves for the common good. You three may, but any others would back out. Get over it."
Tom shooed them off, after warning Lief, Barda, and Jasmine to take the Ra-Kachars' garments with them. Oceanus doubted he wanted to know the details of how they'd gotten those.
As they left the clearing of Tom's shop and were a suitable distance away from the road, the other three admonished him for keeping back information.
"We could have been killed! Why did you keep silent?!" Jasmine hissed. Her green eyes were blazing, and her tanned cheeks flushed scarlet.
Oceanus gave her a scornful look. "Unfortunately, I can't say anything unless you ask me first. Has to do with the promises I made before joining you. You were simply too preoccupied to do so."
"Which is another way of saying we were fools, correct?" Lief demanded hotly. Oceanus regarded him with the same dissention as he had felt as he wrote his journal entries. It still hadn't worn off.
"Precisely. Though it was obvious that I'd traveled beyond the walls of Del and you hadn't, you kept to yourselves and asked only each other about what lies ahead. You all knew and still know nothing about how this place is laid out." An injured pride that had been stifled began rearing its ugly head, and the mage made no move to quell it. "I'm not supposed to meet a Deltoran without killing him. Don't you get it? If I had followed my directions without pause, you wouldn't exist!" Oceanus ignored their cries of shock. He pressed on, letting the targets for his temper feel its full effects. He had kept his mouth shut for too long, and his already-weak control had splintered under the strain. He was absently surprised that he hadn't started shooting ice from his fingertips.
"By some chance, I decided that you morons were more important than my mission – of my home's safety – and chose to help. And what have you done? Refused any advice I could've given with your blasted secrecy, and gotten yourselves into more trouble than should be humanly possible! My patience wasn't very strong to begin with, but you've been pushing it since day one! What in Adin's name about me do you hate so much?!"
Even as he finished, Oceanus was aware of a distinct change in the atmosphere. While it had become more hostile, especially since he first began snapping at them, he could sense a sort of understanding from Lief. Barda distrusted him arguably more, and Jasmine looked stunned by his outburst.
Panting, Oceanus collapsed on the edge of the clearing they were in. His shouting had relieved his own tension, but the pent-up emotions of his comrades were not so suppressed.
Lief sat down beside him, but he decided not to make a move. Barda was calming, slowly, and Jasmine was coming to grips with her stoic comrade's explosive temper quite well.
The mage waited for almost a full minute, wondering what the other boy would say.
Finally, Lief spoke, his voice calmer than Oceanus could ever remember it being. "I believe we are…too used to our ways. Your appearance and powers are unusual, so it is not strange that we cannot trust you in the face of it. The only others who have had similar powers are Thaegan and the Shadow Lord, so I am sure you can understand."
"I guess so." Oceanus said mildly, staring up at the treetops. Lying against the ground was a balm for his nerves, he supposed. "You haven't had a good impression of sorcerers. I get that. But I thought…never mind."
Jasmine seemed to have decided that the melancholy mood had gone on long enough. "What is it?"
"It's just I'd thought that…after Thaegan and Gorl, and everything else…you would have learned a bit about my crazy habits, but I guess that's my fault." He sat up abruptly, smiling a bit sadly. "I can't tell you much beyond the fact that I was ordered to come here. My people – well, mostly my people's leaders – have decided that Deltora's become a threat." The sad smile didn't fade when Lief started in shock.
"Deltora?! How could we be a threat to – wait, where is this home of yours?" Lief asked, after changing his wording mid-sentence.
But Oceanus shook his head, "Lord Roy specifically told me not to mention that. I can tell you this much, though – my original mission was to figure out where key attack sites would be and map everything out. It's not uncommon for my people to send spies months in advance of any attack. If we – or you, I guess – can restore the Belt before the Shadow Lord decides to attack, you'll save both countries from a long, harsh war."
With that sobering thought, the companions continued their journey in relative silence, broken only by Kree's occasional calls.
It only took the four to discover one very big obstacle in their plan to secure the third gem.
Namely, the Broad River itself.
Running a hand through his hair in frustration, Oceanus supposed that the most obvious problems were the only ones left out of his calculations. Every single time, something like this came back to bite him.
"This…is a problem," he said needlessly. Oceanus only saw two options, really. One was to risk revealing a good number of his secret abilities and the other was just to wait until his friends could come up with their own solution.
He chose the latter and was not disappointed.
As the quartet made it across the river with their handy-dandy Water Eaters, Oceanus was pleased to note when he snatched the tin from Lief that there were still a few left. Tucking them into his bag, he sat down as his companions made their preparations for the night.
Just because he was relaxing, however, did not mean that Oceanus was off-guard completely. Even as the sun began to set and his friends built their fire, Oceanus kept his light-sensitive eyes locked on the dark shape of the City of Rats in the distance. While the others kept their minds on their dinner, the young mage could not help but feel like they were being watched.
As before, Oceanus was not proved wrong. The plain was suddenly alive with huge, black rats.
One thought dominated all others in the foursome's minds: run.
And run they did, pausing only long enough to scoop up the fire beads and bolt again. Oceanus had never taken off his bag, but kept pace with the others all the same.
Even as he ran, the sounds of shrieking rats reached his delicate ears. Worse, the sound never seemed to get any farther away. Risking a glance back, he was horrified to discover that for every rat that stopped to devour their belongings, another hundred streamed after them.
It was only seconds until they had reached the bank. Despite that, the rats clawed through the water after them, making up a vile, squealing swarm of bodies.
Despite his restraint, Oceanus barely kept from yelling in shock as a ball of fire engulfed a section of the rats he had been about to freeze solid. Twisting his head, he noticed the jar of fire beads in Lief's hand, and thanked his lucky stars that fortune had finally come knocking. Another magical fire exploded onto the shore, and hundreds of rats simply died of the sudden heat.
He, Barda, and Jasmine worked furiously while Lief lengthened the blazing wall, hacking at the remaining rats in self-defense. The fire wall was working, and eventually no more rats came to challenge them.
Muttering a dark oath under his breath, Oceanus got ready for a long, sleepless night.
They entered the city the next day.
Beforehand, the other three had put on the Ra-Kachars' outfits, which were among the only things untouched by the rats of the previous night. Otherwise, there was the pipe that blew bubbles of light and about three square inches of fabric could have been someone's pack. Oceanus was suddenly very glad that he had never put his down.
As his friends had suited up, he had caught the question in their eyes before they had spoken.
"What will you do? The rats may not find these garments at all tasteful, but I can tell you right now that your outfit is of no protection." Barda put in.
Oceanus smiled at him impishly, feeling strangely awake despite the miserable night. "I do know magic, you know." Cracking his knuckles first, the mage pressed his index fingers together, and snapped both middle fingers. Instantly, he shone with a soft white glow that extended a few inches from his skin and clothes. Shaking himself, Oceanus explained, "It's a type of shield, but I can't cast it on anyone besides myself."
"Is magic really so common a tool where you come from?" Lief looked a little unnerved as he said that.
Oceanus shrugged. "I don't think that that many of my people are magic-users, but definitely more than here."
"Oh," was all the reply he got to that.
As they made their way through the dark city, the others' dubious looks had faded as soon as the first rat had tried to gnaw on their friend. It had slid right off and sported broken teeth immediately afterward when he kicked it.
They made good time after stopping to survey the damage for a bit. The city was completely closed off from the sky and the plains which made it a rather eerie place to be. Oceanus rocked on his heels when his companions dallied too long at a single area, sniffing the air. Rat was the dominating scent, but there was an undertone of something else…
At that instant, Lief took off running. Jumping in alarm, the mage and the boy's two other friends scampered after him. It wasn't easy – Lief was unusually fast, and there were yet more rats to avoid tripping on.
Eventually, after much more running and dodging crumbling architecture, the trailing threesome managed to catch up with their fleet-footed friend. They found him in what had once been a massive meeting hall, with great oak beams spanning the ceiling. Something in the darkness shifted, and Oceanus's eyes went wide when he saw exactly what.
A snake.
I hate snakes, Oceanus thought absently as he took in the full form of the monstrous reptile. It was as thick as an ancient tree and almost a hundred feet long. Its scales were a combination of forest green and olive, with a rust-red belly with massive sections, like a caterpillar's. As its vast body swayed like a desert cobra, its head finally came into sight.
On the giant serpent's brow was the crowning glory – literally. A gold crown rested there, inlaid with the largest opal any of them had ever seen. However, it was the exact size and shape of the other gems in the Belt of Deltora.
Oceanus supposed he might have gone temporarily deaf, since he failed to hear Barda or Jasmine ducking out of the way of the beast's tail, or the snake's hissing commands. He did, however, hear Lief shout parts of what seemed a one-sided conversation. In any case, the mage concluded from its quiet, malevolent laughter that Lief was losing his battle of words.
Oceanus saw the fangs flash before the other boy did, shrouded as they were in shadow.
He did the only thing he could. He tackled Lief out of the way of the strike.
Lief, thankfully, had not lost hold of his sword with his fall, and now they were both slightly more prepared to take on their foe. Oceanus concentrated, and brought a flickering white light to his hand. It shook and it sizzled in the air, barely contained by his control.
As Lief hurled the jar of fire beads at the beast (and missed), however, Oceanus's magic sputtered and died.
Lief was suddenly aware that his companion had frozen where he stood, eyes wide as he stared at the massive fireball. It was that moment of stillness that the snake took advantage of, smashing the mage into a column and reducing it to splinters. He didn't stir, and his magic shield gave out.
At that exact instant, as Reeah's head drew lower to strike at Lief, rather than the others, Lief's sword was wrenched from his grip and went flying. He managed to sidestep the second attack of the snapping jaws, but didn't dodge far enough.
The next thing he knew, Reeah had him.
It all happened so quickly next – one moment Jasmine had appeared in his sight again, the next she had carved the massive snake's throat out. And then he was hitting the ground…and nothing.
It took Lief a while to come to, but eventually everyone was awake and more or less alright. Oceanus was completely silent as they hurried out of the ruins of the City of the Rats (which proceeded to collapse on itself), not even commenting when Lief revealed the connection between Noradz and the structure they'd just fled.
He didn't respond to Jasmine's prodding about why he'd frozen like that, either. Oceanus had looked like he was going to hit her at one point, since she could be as annoyingly persistent as an itch sometimes.
Finally, he stood up and said, "There's still a lot of work to do. Don't tell me you plan on staying here all day?"
A/N: That seemed like a good place to leave that off. Geez, that's over 4,700 words right there. Man, the chapters keep stretching like taffy…
Illuminé: Alana's mother, who may appear in the later chapters. She has a very nasty temper, and is also ridiculously powerful.
Radon: Alana's father, who is very unlikely to show up later. He fits the idea of a 'reluctant hero' to the letter.
Sahara: Keras's mother, who probably won't debut until the chapters on Dragons of Deltora (yes, this story is going to span all of the series). She's very talkative and a bit crazy, but she does know when to come down hard.
Copernicus: Keras's father, an unlikely candidate for much of anything until the later chapters. He is nice, but he is also the 'Robin Hood' character of the group.
Oceanus's old man and mom aren't going to come until the middle part of the story, and they won't be staying for long.
Top of Form
Bottom of Form