Chapter fourteen

The problem, of course, was that the most effective means of shocking the village into admitting responsibility for their attack would be to ride in and deposit the corpse in the center of town for all to see. But Eothen was not in any shape to travel for a day at least, and in any case it was more than a day's ride back to the village. The corpse, even if they left that same moment, would be in an advanced state of rot by the time they arrived, and they needed to make a plan before they left, in any case. Eothen was incredibly unhappy to have to stay put; she didn't feel safe here, anymore, not knowing that at least one person from the previous town had tracked and tried to kill her. How was she to know there weren't more?

:If anyone on our backtrail sought to kill you, soulsister, I would find them and I would kill them.: said Rika.

Comforting, Eothen thought. But why hadn't Aladrian sensed this man's presence? Eothen was bonded to him long before Rika had ever entered the picture, and she knew he hadn't been just not paying attention.

:He had not been following us for long.: said Aladrian. :In fact, he had not been on our backtrail at all. He seems to have been spirited to our camp from some distance away, and believe me, I do not know how. Or by whom.:

:I know you would never let anyone sneak up on me.: said Eothen. :It's not your fault.:

She could 'hear' Aladrian's frustration and guilt that he hadn't been able to protect her, but what she said was true – it hadn't been his fault. He hadn't sensed the man because he wasn't there; which left them with the additional problem of figuring out exactly how the man had mysteriously appeared.

:There is only one way I know of to 'spirit' anyone from one place to another, and there is no one left in this world capable of doing it.: said Taia. :Besides, if that was how it was done, it would leave a magical trace that Aladrian or Rika could sense, and if they could not, I could – and there is no such trace.:

:What is it, a spell or something?: asked Eothen. Even if Taia said it was impossible, she wanted to know what it was; there was always the possibility that the ghost was wrong.

:Hmph.: said Taia. :I am not wrong. Not about this, anyway. It is called a Gate; it is a high-level spell that an Adept-level mage – you don't need to know what that means, they don't exist anymore – could do. After the magestorms, there were only a handful of mages that could even do it then. I was one of them, and Whitestar another, and largely only because we could use each other's energy as easily as we could breathe. By the end of our lives, we couldn't even do it anymore. Magic now is much too weak for any existing mage to be able to do this spell. I couldn't even do it now, were I still, you know, existing.:

Oh. Well, then, there was that.

:There is such a thing as an illusion, however.: said Taia cryptically. Aladrian picked his head up from where he was grazing, put his ears back and stamped at what appeared to be empty air; Rika growled in the same direction. Apparently, thought Eothen, that's where Taia 'was'. Alek looked up, confused, but decided Aladrian was just frustrated with a conversation he was having with Eothen. It wasn't entirely incorrect; the fact that Eothen could just pretend to be having a conversation with Aladrian, and now Rika, was very handy, considering her conversations also included an actual ghost.

:An illusion?: asked Eothen.

:They require much less magic than a Gate. I used to use them quite frequently. If that man had been illusioned to appear as a bush, for example, he could have been standing right in front of you for days and you would have never seen anything other than a bush.: said Taia.

:I would have sensed that.: said Aladrian angrily.

:With respect, horse, I doubt you would have.: said Taia. :The amount of energy it requires for a very simple illusion is scarcely more than the ambient level. Your kind is sensitive to magic, yes; but you would notice a change in the ambient level of magic around you. You would not notice a simple illusion, since it doesn't change the level at all.:

Aladrian held his ears back and stamped his foot again, but he didn't argue. Even he had to admit that Taia likely knew more about this than he did; the fact didn't make him happy, but it didn't change the fact, either. It did explain how the man had followed them for days without being noticed, but it did not explain who it had been to cast this illusion. And it did not explain why, when they were in the village in question, they had not noticed the presence of a mage.

:That one I probably am responsible for.: said Aladrian, hanging his head. :We aren't used to looking for mages anymore. There haven't been any in a generation at least.:

:Even that you shouldn't take the blame for.: said Rika. :With a good shield, even if you had been actively looking for a mage, you wouldn't have seen him. And there haven't been active mages for a generation, as you say, so why would you have been looking?:

Aladrian put his ears back again, but he lowered his head and closed his shining blue eyes.

:My Chosen almost died because I did not see him coming, and what's worse, was too exhausted to hear her call.: he said dejectedly.

:Enough of that.: said Eothen. :I didn't call, anyway, so there was nothing to hear.:

:It doesn't matter anymore anyway, it's done, and the task at hand is to make a plan of how to address it.: Rika was clearly tired of all the time they were wasting feeling guilty and wanted to move on to solutions. Eothen couldn't say as she disagreed. She knew Aladrian felt terrible, but she also knew that if it had been possible for him to come to her rescue, nothing would have stopped him. So there was no point in continuing to wallow in unfounded guilt. There would never have been an issue in the first place had she not been stupid enough to leave camp to go hunting alone in a strange forest without a decent weapon in the first place, so if there was blame to be had, it was hers. If she had not broken a child's rule, she would not have needed rescuing.

"I'm going to go into the woods with Kasara," said Alek. "Clearly, we won't be able to actually take the body back to the village; it would be rotten before we got there. But maybe if we just take some identifying clothing, that will be sufficient."

"Good idea," said Eothen. "I'm in no condition to do it myself, and I'm sure you'll be able to find it."

"When I get back, we need to sit down and discuss a plan," said Alek. "I'm afraid we'll need at least a few members of the Guard, but I don't know where to find them right at the moment."

In the past, the Guard had always been stationed in various towns, relatively permanently – the actual members of the Guard at any one station would change as they were promoted, recruited, killed or retired – but the posts themselves stayed the same. It was the Heralds that had maintained a circuit, keeping order, communication, settling disputes; but there weren't enough Heralds anymore, or enough Guard, and disputes tended to get more violent more quickly than they had in the past, so the Guard kept up a circuit as well. This made it more possible for them to be present in more areas more frequently, and hopefully keep riots from developing; but if a riot did develop, or they were needed for something, it made it much more difficult to find them.

"I wonder if it would be worth the time and effort for Aladrian to Mindspeak Taver again and try to find out where they are," said Eothen.

:Oh, gods, I hope I don't have to do that again.: said Aladrian. :It was almost impossible the first time, and I really don't relish the idea of being out of commission – again – for a full day.:

:I know, but we may not have another option.: said Eothen.

:We have plenty of options, youngling.: said Taia. :Farsight is one of my Gifts, afterall, I can look for the Guard and tell you where they are. Rika can scout, as well, but I think my Farsight is the quicker and easier option.:

:Good. Thank you.: said Eothen. :I will give Aladrian the credit. He's going to be the realm's most powerful Companion, soon enough.:

Taia chuckled. Aladrian snorted.

"Aladrian is going to use some kind of magic to look for the Guard," Eothen told Alek.

"How is it that Aladrian has all these capabilities and Kasara doesn't?" asked Alek. Eothen panicked – she didn't have an answer for this. But it seemed Kasara did, because Alek got that blank stare that meant Kasara was talking to him. His face went a bit pale, then he started looking around frantically at things that weren't there – and Eothen realized Kasara had actually told him the truth.

"You – " Alek stuttered – "talk to spirits?"

"Um….." Eothen wasn't much more eloquent. "I didn't start it, apparently she's an ancestor of mine. These swords I use – they were hers."

"YOU ARE RELATED TO TAIA SHENA PRETERA'SEDRIN K'TREVA?!" squeaked Alek.

"Um…yes, her youngest sister was my many-times grandmother," said Eothen. "Wait, you've heard of her?"

"You hadn't?!" said Alek. "She and Whitestar are only the most famous people in all of Velgarth, along with Urtho, Ma'ar and Vanyel. How did you not mention this to me?!"

"I kind of thought she was a myth," said Eothen. "But in any case, she's been dead for generations. How would you have heard of her?"

"History is my favorite subject," said Alek. "I love history. If I live long enough to retire from riding circuit, I want to teach history at the Collegium. And Taia was fascinating, I have read every story ever written about her."

:Well.: said Taia. :This is embarrassing. Please tell him to not believe everything he reads, and the books always leave out the good part. Like the part where I made a wagon out of a tree with MageGift. It….was somewhat less than attractive.:

:You are definitely telling me that story.: said Eothen.

"She says to tell you hello," said Eothen, and enjoyed watching Alek's face go pale. "She also says not to believe everything you read, and the books leave out the good parts."

"Hello," Alek squeaked. "Why can she talk to you and not me?"

"Jealous?" asked Eothen. "I must admit, it's rather inconvenient to have conversations with 'people' no one else can see, or to have to come up with reasons for how Aladrian seems to be more powerful than he is. Not that Aladrian is not wonderful, but he is not a mage. Also, you've noticed my lacerations are healed."

"Oh," said Alek. "Taia wasn't a Healer, though – "

"No," said Eothen. "But Whitestar was."

"Whitestar talks to you too?" asked Alek, incredulous.

"No," said Eothen. "Only Taia, but Whitestar can Heal me. It's how I survived the injury that gave me this gimp leg."

She decided not to mention the months of recovery where she thought she was insane, hearing this voice in her head without a physical body to attach it too. This whole situation already made her feel crazy; she didn't need to add to it.

"Did you know Whitestar was a descendant of Vanyel Ashkevron?" asked Alek, clearly star-struck.

"No," said Eothen. "But she probably knew."

"Vanyel spent a good portion of his afterlife helping Valdemar, too," said Alek.

:That is true.: said Taia. :Both parts. It's actually how we got the idea to stick around; neither of us was quite ready to just drift off into the netherworld, but we weren't so excited about reincarnation, either.:

:You've just given me so many more questions than you answered.: said Eothen. :As usual.:

:And unfortunately, I'm not allowed to answer them.: said Taia.

:Hmph.: said Eothen. She didn't see how Taia could be stopped from answering any question she wanted to; who was going to punish her? She was already dead.

:You have forgotten the Goddess.: said Taia. :The fact that your people ignore her now does not mean she is not real.:

Eothen would have to think about that.

"Taia says that's how they got the idea," she said aloud. "From Vanyel. Anyway, she's the one who boosted Aladrian to talk to Taver; he actually can't do it alone. And she's offering to use Farsight to locate the Guard for us."

"But why can't she speak to me directly?" Alek nearly whined.

:When I was alive, I was a strong enough Mindspeaker to speak to anyone I chose, whether or not they had the Gift, and from quite a distance besides.: said Taia. :But as it turns out, the 'distance' between being dead and alive means I can only Mindspeak someone with the Gift, not without. And it is made easier with you because we are related.:

"She says it's because you don't have Mindspeech," Eothen said.

"Oh," said Alek dejectedly. "I've never been so upset to only have Thoughtsensing in my life."

"Back to the problem at hand," said Eothen, who was getting a little tired of not only being a go-between between Alek and Taia, but also of being looked at as some sort of oddity for being related to a very famous dead person. Taia was certainly great, but Eothen was her own person, and intended on being treated as such.

:You get that from me, too.: said Taia.

:Hmph.: said Eothen.

"Yes, of course," said Alek, settling back a bit.

"Taia is going to look for the Guard, but we need to discuss what we are going to do if we find them," Eothen said. "And we also need to discuss what we are going to do if we don't. It's possible they are far enough away that they can't help much, anyway."

"True," said Alek. "The two of us together, with the Companions and Rika – we could put quite a dent in their defense, if it came to violence. But I'm not convinced we could defeat them. And if there is someone there doing some sort of magic – we have no idea what he is capable of. We'd be walking in unprepared completely."

"Well," said Eothen, "we don't just have the five of us. We have the seven of us."

:Correction.: said Taia. :Whitestar can't do anything for Alek, and truthfully, neither can I. The bounds of our deal was that we were only to assist whichever of my descendent happens to be carrying the swords and is able to Hear me – not her mentor. So Whitestar can Heal you, but not Alek. I can talk to you, and those you are bonded to, but not Alek. Not even Hexen. I don't want you to make plans based on what you think I can do, and then end up in trouble because I cannot.:

:If all you're supposed to do is talk to me or Heal me, aren't you already bending the rules by using your Gifts to aid Aladrian and find the Guard?: asked Eothen.

:Smart girl.: said Taia. :We are allowed to use our Gifts in anything to assist you. But direct aid to Alek – such as Healing, or augmenting his Gifts – we are not allowed.:

"Never mind," said Eothen. "Taia says they cannot do anything directly to help you, only me, because of rules and descendent and all that. So how about we let Taia find the Guard, and then base our plan on whether or not it's feasible to get anyone to help us?"

"I wish I had some powerful famous ancestor," said Alek. "But that's a good way to start. The rest of whatever we come up with depends on whether or not we can get help anyway, so there's not much point in making plans until we have that information."

:True enough.: said Taia. :True enough.: