For a day and a night and a day, the servants of the temple waited within the inner sanctum, the walls lit only by Ramuh's eternal flame. The servants were fearful, but the clergy provided what comfort they could, and the brave temple guards stood with their backs braced against the door as the sounds of fierce battle raged outside.
By the second night, all was silent, and Hildagarde ordered the doors opened, so great was her worry for her sisters, but her worry soon transformed to grief at the scene of carnage she beheld, for her sisters had been slain.
She first found Tsanegi, the warrior tall and proud, pierced by her own spear. She had died before the door, defending it to the last. Hildagarde wept, and moved on. Next found was Sindila, the cleric, whose spells had been unable to save her from her own death. Hildagarde wept, and moved on.
But when she reached Amandine, the wild and reckless black mage, Hildagarde wept joyous tears to find her only remaining sister still alive. Hildagarde called to her priests for healing, but Amandine spoke, saying, "Nay. It is too late for me. No healing can undo these wounds."
The priests bowed their heads, for they could see Amandine's soul was weakened beyond hope, but Hildagarde would not listen. She attempted the healing herself, but she had never been as strong as her sisters and she lacked the strength for white magics. "Please," she begged. "I cannot face this world without you."
"You must," Amandine said. "For the beast we fought here is not truly dead. We have destroyed its physical form with our dying breaths, but still it lives on in the aether. It will regain its body, and when it has, I fear it will return."
The temple servants wailed in fear, for what could they do against such a creature - one that had been the bane of the magus sisters - when the sisters could no longer defend them?
Amandine said, "This spell I will teach you, one that can Cure the dead in their undeath, the last spell my sisters and I cast together." And she drew the spell there on the temple floor, right atop the holy seal, in her heart's own blood. Then, to Hildagarde, she said, "You must take Ramuh's flame, and flee. Under no circumstances can that holy fire fall into this creature's hands, for it would use that power for unspeakable ends."
But Hildagarde trembled. "How can I do this thing? I do not know the world beyond these walls. I have never left this temple."
"My soul will go with you," Amandine said. "As will the souls of our sisters, to guide and guard you however we may, for we cannot rest while this creature persists." And so saying, she died there in her sister's arms.
From "A Spell to Cure the Dead", The Ars Paladia, as translated by Melanie the Wise, Queen Consort of King Titus VI of House Plein.
She hadn't made it through the day. The guilt niggled at her, but she couldn't help it. She'd managed only a few hours before the stories, the descriptions, drove her retching from the library. Jack had followed her out, held her as she tried to slow her breathing.
"It's alright, my lady," he'd said. "You don't need to stay. Redden and I can do it."
She'd gone to the lake again, and though she'd intended to go back to him afterward, there had been no time. She'd swam until sunset without realizing it. Jack had come looking for her in the dark, drying her clothing with a spell and wrapping her up in his coat before he led her back to the Randells' house where the others were already at dinner. Her stomach rebelled at the thought of eating, and she picked at her food, noticing that neither Jack nor Redden seemed to have much of an appetite.
She slept poorly, dreaming of what she'd read. They'd only been stories, hearsay, garbled histories passed down by people who hadn't been there. No one studied necromancy. It was foul, that foul. There were no books of theories, of spells, no aether diagrams for it. There were only the stories. And those... they were more than Lena could bear.
"My lady?" Jack whispered in the quiet dark, waking her from another disturbing dream. He stood a few feet from the bed, come to wake her as he'd promised he would the night before.
"Is it sunrise already?" she muttered.
"A bit before," he said. "I was awake, and you seemed... I thought you would rather I wake you now."
She nodded. "I'll be down soon," she said.
He waved a hand, whispering a spell, and the candle she'd left on the bedside table sprang alight. "I'll wait for you outside," he said. Lukahn slept in the armchair downstairs - Jack wouldn't wait for her there.
She nodded again, and he left her to get dressed.
The Circle would speak to her today. Randell had told her at dinner. She had asked Jack to wake her - he always rose so early - so that she would have time for another swim beforehand, to clear her head. She hadn't been sure she would need it, having swam so long the previous day, but after the dreams she'd had, she was glad she'd planned for it.
She crept down the stairs, wincing as they creaked. She hadn't heard Jack leaving at all, but then he had lived here before. He would know which stairs to tread lightly on. Still, she needn't have worried. She could hear Lukahn snoring in front of the hearth as she reached the door. A few coals still glowed in the fireplace, though the house was chilly now. She'd learned he kept the place uncomfortably hot whenever he'd predicted a cold night. She sighed, thinking of how cold the lake would be.
Jack waited on the stoop, eyes glowing faintly as the sky grew from black to slate gray, the same color as the scarf he currently wore. She took his arm as she had often done before, and he walked with her though she knew the way to the lake's northern cove by now. Crescent Lake was not a big village, not compared to the streets of Cornelia where she'd lived for so long. She was glad of his company, nonetheless.
"You don't need to be afraid," he said as they walked. "Orin will be with you. And Thad says they really did just ask questions. They're good people, the sages."
"I'm not afraid," she assured him.
He shrugged. She felt a sliver of doubt.
"I'm not," she said, chuckling. "We've done nothing wrong. I'll tell them what's happened to us, and they can make of that what they will."
"Hmm," he said, still doubting.
He's worried about his own interview, she thought. His would be last, after hers and then Kane's. In the meantime, he would go back to the library with Redden. And read about necromancy. She shuddered.
"Are you cold?" he asked. He made a move, as if to shrug out of his coat and offer it to her.
"No," Lena said quickly. "Not yet anyway. The water will be cold enough, I'm sure."
"I'll light a fire for you," he said. "It's no trouble."
"That would be pleasant," she said.
To her surprise, he led her a different way, past the path marked by the gnarled old tree, farther into the village. "I thought you'd like to see the docks," he explained, when she asked. "It's closer to the Chamber, so you can swim until the last possible minute, if you wish."
She nodded, though part of her worried the docks would be too crowded and she would have to swim fully clothed.
The "docks" though, were not only abandoned, they were barely docks, as far as Lena defined them. Thick wooden poles dotted a short stretch of shore, each with a little canoe or rowboat tied off to them, tiny boats for pleasure fishing, nothing more. A few spots had short wooden docks jutting out into the water, but most only had the poles; whoever used those would have to get their feet wet, pushing their boats out and jumping in after.
Jack kept his back to her when they reached docks, working on the fire as she stripped down to her shift. She entered the water quickly, gasping at the cold as she hurried to submerge herself. "You can look now," she said when she stood in water up to her shoulders.
She was surprised when she looked back how close to shore she was. This part of the lake was deeper than the cove; there, she had had to walk out quite a ways to reach this same depth. Still, in the dim light, Jack seemed only a shadow behind her, a pair of glowing eyes beside the fire, and she took that image of him with her as she began to swim back and forth, back and forth.
The sun had just broken from the horizon when she went back to him, shivering.
He closed his eyes as she approached. "How was it?"
"Almost too cold!" she admitted, searching for her clothes where she'd left them. It took her a moment to realize Jack had moved them closer to the fire. Leviathan bless him, she thought, smiling, dressing quickly to combat the chill.
"You can open your eyes," she said. She yelped as his drying spell hit her, a blast of warm air that seemed to envelope her completely and then vanish just as quickly as it appeared. She pushed her hair, now dry but disheveled, out of her face, and she smiled. "That's so handy!"
"An extravagant waste of aether," he said, with what Lena thought was a grin beneath his scarf. "One of the least efficient spells I know."
"Well, I thank you for wasting it on me," she said, giggling.
He reached into his coat, pulling a little cloth sack from one of the inner pockets, and when she looked inside, she found it contained a small breakfast for her - a slice of cold bacon, a flaky biscuit, and several of the tiny round tomatoes from Dahlia's garden, as red as any jewels. She smiled, holding one out to him, but he shook his head.
"I've had mine already," he said.
"Liar," she said, though she sensed humor from him and knew he meant it as a joke.
"You've caught me," he said, looking down at the fire with laughter in his eyes. "I will eat. I promise. After you've gone for your inquest."
"Is it..." She stopped, unsure how to phrase her question. She realized she was embarrassed to ask, but she'd already started, so she took a breath and plowed on. "Are you ashamed to eat in front of me? Still?"
The hint of laughter faded from his expression. He seemed to shrink in on himself. "Yes," he said simply, looking away from her.
"Oh, Jack." She wanted to hold him, but he seemed so far away, on the other side of the fire. She imagined him fleeing like a frightened deer if she made any sudden moves. Instead, she stayed where she was, but her heart went out to him. "I thought we were past that."
His eyes flicked up to her, sharp in the firelight. "I'm not sure I'll ever be past that."
She sighed, looking away. She nibbled at the bacon, no longer hungry, but he had brought it for her so she would eat it.
They sat in silence for a time before she became aware of noise, the sounds of conversation farther down the docks. She looked that way, seeing some boys arriving, about eight of them, talking loudly as boys often did in large groups. They were all carrying... something. Lena couldn't tell what. But then the boys crowded around one of the docks, putting their various bundles in the water, and Lena realized the contraptions were little sailboats.
"Do you know them?" Lena asked.
Jack didn't even look up from the fire. "Probably."
He didn't seem the least bit surprised at the boys' arrival. Lena wondered if he'd known they were coming. She watched them fiddling with their boats, and not one of them looked her way - they either hadn't noticed or hadn't cared that she and Jack were there. She realized they were older than she'd initially thought - young men, really, at least her own age, some older.
"They look a little old for toy boats," she said, musing out loud.
"Not for those boats," Jack said, shrugging.
And then the boats moved. The sunrise reflected off the rippling lake, making it difficult for Lena to see, so it took her a moment to realize the boats were moving on their own. She gasped, standing to get a better look. "Machina! Oh, can we go see?"
He didn't answer, but she felt something from him, something strange, a mix of fear and dread and...
Hate. It was hate. But not toward the boys on the docks, Lena realized. Self loathing. Something about these boys made Jack hate himself. More than he does already, anyway, Lena thought.
She turned to him, intent on holding him now even if he did try to run like a forest creature, but as she did she saw a man in a white robe approaching up the path she and Jack had walked that morning.
Lena recognized Wrede right away. He lifted a hand in greeting. "Good morning, you two!" he said cheerfully. "Miss Lena, are you ready for your interview?"
"Yes, I suppose," she said. "How did you find us?"
Wrede shrugged. "I tracked you, of course."
"Tracked us?" She cocked her head, looking at Wrede's face, detecting a hint of a corona around his eyes. "You mean through the aether?"
"Yes," Wrede said laughing. "What else would I mean?"
"He's a black mage by birth," Jack said, still sitting beside the fire. "Most of the white mages here are."
Wrede nodded. "Not many white mages born in this part of the world. Something about the environment. Myron could tell you more about it, if that interests you."
"I would suggest you not get him started on it, my lady, unless you're prepared for a three hour lecture," Jack put in.
Wrede chuckled. "True. But we've a fair number of mages here - both black and red - who have taken the white oath. And I believe you'll find us at least as knowledgeable in the craft as your mages at White Hall, if perhaps less powerful."
Lena blushed. "I meant no disrespect! I was only surprised. I'm just not used to white mages being black mages! Or... black mages being... um... It... it sounds silly saying it out loud!"
"Yes, you're right about that. Imagine how it sounded when I told my father I intended to do it!" He motioned up the path that led back into town. "Well, shall we?"
She nodded, stepping toward him, but she stopped, looking back to Jack. "Will you walk with us?" she asked him.
Jack shook his head. "I'll wait here a bit longer. I'm not..." He closed his eyes, swallowed as though he had a great lump in his throat. "I'm not yet ready to return to the library."
"Oh," she said awkwardly. "Right. Yes. Take your time." She took another step away from him, but then she turned back, closing the gap between them and folding him in an embrace before he had time to react. He stiffened beneath her touch like a startled cat, but she held him tight. "Take care of yourself, Jack," she whispered into his ear. Then she broke from him and hurried over to join Wrede on the path.
"Lena?" Jack called after her.
She looked.
He hadn't moved, still sat beside the fire, but his eyes met hers and held them. "You do the same."
She nodded. "I will," she promised. Then she walked with Wrede toward the Circle Chamber where the sages waited to speak with her.
"...and though there have been no studies confirming it, it has been theorized that the aetherial make-up of women of child-bearing age, being more compatible with the creative energies of the lifestream, is preferable when creating undead, as those raised through such powers seem to preserve more sentience than other necromantic creations, though anecdotal evidence suggests that such creations also rot at an accelerated rate."
Redden rubbed his eyes, remembering the undead he'd faced in the cave south of Melmond, remembering their various states of decay. He pushed the book aside, breathing deeply with his eyes closed.
"How far have you gotten?" Jack asked from across the table, his voice emotionless.
"Women of child-bearing age," Redden told him.
"Hmm," said Jack. "Wait until you get to the section on women who are with child."
Redden opened his eyes, looking at Jack, trying to determine if the young man was joking, but Jack's expression gave nothing away, his eyes cold and vacant as he focused on the book in front of him. A man had to shove his emotions down - deep down - to keep reading such... filth.
Even the sages had refused to help them. The books on necromancy, no more than thirty tomes altogether, had been untouched for years, a single shelf at the back of the library, covered in dust. Mages considered the subject unlucky. The handful of scribes and apprentices who continued to study aetherial theory while the sages were off conducting their interviews kept their distance from the table where Redden and Jack studied, quickening their pace when they needed to pass by to access the shelves on aetherite and binding spells, seeking more information about the orbs.
Still, the books on necromancy had brought them some answers, if not the answers they sought. Each of the books seemed to contain at least one fact they could use, buried amidst the pages and pages of disgusting refuse. For example, they'd learned that the necromancer of Melmond, Lord Eldieme, hadn't been just any necromancer: he'd been a Lich, a type of undead formed when a man bound his still-living soul to something outside of his body, so that he couldn't be killed by normal means. Redden and Jack had spent a good hour discussing that section, trying to establish what Eldieme's soul could have been bound to, debating on whether or not it could have possibly been bound to the orb of earth. Was it possible that Lena's Shell had cut it off, not from the aether itself, but more specifically from the aether that bound it to Kane's sword?
The lich had been only one of perhaps fifty types of undead chronicled in one of the books they were studying, a sort of necromantic bestiary. The book had described vampires as well, and the creatures that went with them, both zombies and ghouls, as well as other things Redden had never heard of before, including hideous beasts formed by stitching multiple body parts together in unholy rituals. They'd learned seemingly nothing else of substance from that particular book, though both Redden and Jack had read the whole thing in turn, just in case something useful had leaped out at them.
Redden stood, stretching, and crossed the room to where a pitcher of magically chilled water stood by. Pearl allowed no liquid near his books, but people were welcome to drink away from the study tables. Redden sipped, enjoying the taste of the water here. It seemed... smoother than the water back home, he thought, and then he realized by "home" he meant Cornelia. I just left Melmond, he thought. I was just there. It's fresh on my mind. And yet, I think of Cornelia. It felt bittersweet, the realization that he'd finally - finally - left Melmond behind in his heart.
When he returned to the table, he found Jack staring out the window, toward the Circle Chamber that stood nearby. The fat book that sat open in front him was written in Leifenish, in huge blocky letters, handwritten by some unknown scholar in the past. Jack had a page of notes beside it, a quill in his hand, but there were no Leifenish dictionaries, no indexes. Jack hardly needed them. The lad was a scholar, Redden thought to himself. Smart as a whip. His own son was no idiot, it was true, but Kane's talents had never been in books and learning. Kane thought with his heart. How often had Redden wished that Kane could be more like him?
Redden sighed. "Something interesting out that window?"
Jack shook himself, as though trying to clear his head. "Sorry," he said lamely, looking down at his book again.
"Don't be," Redden said. "In fact, I think we've seen enough for one day." He reached over, closing the book in front of Jack and pushing it across the table.
"Oh?" Jack said, looking up at him with confused eyes. "But... but there's plenty of daylight left!"
"Yes." Redden nodded. "I suggest we go sit in it. Come on, lad. I know where your mind is." He patted Jack's shoulder, motioning him to stand, then shuffled him outside.
Across from the Circle Chamber, they sat on the wide stone steps of a building that Jack said was a prayer chamber. The doors stood open, revealing a large, open room with a couple of benches facing the wooden altar at the end of it. No one was praying there in the middle of the afternoon.
"It's rarely used," Jack said, face hidden behind his hands as he ate the sandwich of bread and cheese Redden had procured for him from the little shop down the way. "Not many people here are that religious, and most who are have private altars at home. Shrines in the garden, that sort of thing."
Redden turned on the steps to look behind him, into the chamber. Though Jack had told him it wasn't dedicated to any particular god - the citizens of Crescent Lake had a diverse range of beliefs - he could see their symbols carved into the walls, the altar: Leviathan's anchor, the sinuous dragon that represented Bahamut, Ramuh's stylized lightning bolt, others he vaguely recognized. "It's rather a nice building for one that doesn't get used." His own half-eaten sandwich sat beside him on a napkin. Hungry as he was, he couldn't stop thinking about the things he'd read that morning, even in the presence of the gods.
Jack shrugged. "There's usually a gathering every solstice. Or when couples want to introduce their newborns to the village. But those celebrations always spill out into the street anyway." He shoved the last of his sandwich into his mouth, then pulled his scarf back up and crossed his arms over his knees, staring toward the closed doors of the Circle Chamber across the square.
Redden thought about Lena in there. She would have Orin at her side, as Thad had done during his own interview these past two days, but Redden knew the boy had found the experience exhausting. Question after question, he'd said, and he'd had to sit still for it all. Thad had found that part particularly intolerable - he was like Kane in that regard.
"Hmm," Redden said, thinking. "I wonder how Thad's doing."
Jack chuckled. "Not well, I imagine. Miss Dahlia will have put him to work by now."
"I'm sure!" Redden said, laughing. "I don't think he knew what he was getting into when he asked to stay with Kane today."
"Well, it was either that or Master Lukahn," Jack said. "I know which I prefer."
"I knew Lukahn once," Redden said. "Years ago. In Cornelia. I know you don't care for him, but - forgive me - at the time, at least, he seemed more... even tempered?... than I'm finding Miss Dahlia."
Jack's eyes creased in what might have been a smile under his scarf. "I've always liked Miss Dahlia. She never treated me differently than anyone else."
Redden scoffed. "That's because she hates everyone equally."
Jack nodded. "Exactly."
Across the square, the Chamber doors opened. Jack's head snapped up, instantly at attention. A few people exited - scribes and apprentices, from the look of them - and they turned to the side, toward the library, scurrying away, but then Lena stepped out, squinting into the sunlight, and Jack leaped up from the steps where he sat and strode over to her.
Redden followed, steering himself toward Orin, just coming out of the Chamber behind her. "What's going on?" he asked the monk. "Thad's interview lasted a lot longer than this."
Orin shrugged. "Only a recess. Young master Shipman does not do well in the presence of those he views as figures of authority. Miss Lena answers their questions thoroughly and well. Generally the first time she is asked. She has given them much to think about. They required some time to discuss it, I think."
Redden glanced at her, speaking quietly with Jack a little ways away from them. She looked wide-eyed and tired. Even if the sages were calm about it, a soul reader wouldn't have done well with being surrounded and questioned all day. She rubbed at one of her eyes almost sleepily, and Redden noticed that the woven bracelet she usually wore on her wrist was gone. "Where's the orb?" he asked.
"Not to worry," Orin said. "The sages have borrowed it. They wished to study it, after what Lena told them. It seems they found the testimony of a white mage easier to believe than that of a discourteous young thief. We must ask Jack to give his own orb over to them, for a little while at least."
"I'll tell him," Redden said. Jack won't like that.
Orin nodded. "Good, good. Meanwhile, I will go and fetch the other two. I wish to check on my apprentice."
Redden nodded as Orin walked away. As he watched, Jack reached into his coat, pulling a small ledger from an inner pocket. The lad removed a small blue flower he'd pressed inside - Redden didn't know where he'd got it - and he held it out to Lena. The girl blushed, smiling. Jack shuffled his feet as he gave it to her, looking anywhere but at her, and it was clear her reaction pleased him.
Redden smiled, remembering his wife. He'd been a stuttering fool around her too, in the beginning. But Rachel wasn't a soul reader, he thought. He sighed. He and Jack would have to have that conversation again. Redden didn't look forward to it.
But not today, Redden thought, remembering the things they'd spent the morning reading, the ugliness of them. Those books waited in the library for their return. Let him have one beautiful thing today... Even if it isn't real.
"These, we cut back," Dahlia explained, handing Thad the largest pair of sheers he'd ever seen. He wasn't sure he could even grip them; his hands were so sore from pulling all those weeds. "The tops are dead now, do you see? But the roots are alright, resting. We clear this away, leave an open path for new growth in the spring." It was some kind of lily, she'd said.
Thad nodded, but he didn't care. Who cared about flowers? If you couldn't eat them, or make medicine out of them, what was the point? Yet Thad stood surrounded by them.
A Sisters' Garden, Dahlia called it, in honor of the women in the old story, the same story he had seen in Lena's fancy book. Some regarded the sisters as goddesses, for they were daughters of Ramuh, so the garden was a sort of shrine to them. Amandine, Hildagarde, and the other two - Thad couldn't remember their names - had apparently been named after flowers. Apparently, the names in common speech were Lily, Iris, Rose, and, of course, Dahlia.
The woman currently bossing Thad around had little in common with her white mage namesake. She showed him where to cut the broad leaves, the thick stalks, down close to the ground, and the two of them stacked the cuttings in a pile waiting for Kane to return with the barrow. Where was he? At least when Kane came back, Thad had an excuse to rest. He's probably lounging in the sun somewhere while I do all the work, Thad thought.
"Good," Dahlia said when he'd finished trimming - his hands hurt. "We'll dump last year's mulch on this ground you've just cleared, and take the stalks to the pile to be next year's mulch. It's a very tidy cycle."
"I thought you said you were clearing a path for new growth?" Thad asked. "Why are we burying them?" It seemed like a lot of extra work to clear things only to cover them again.
"A blanket for their bed," Dahlia said. "I told you, the roots are resting. They appreciate the warmth. And I clear it away again in the spring. If you're still here then, I'll show you."
"Great," Thad said.
"Mind your tone," Dahlia said. "You wanted to stay here today, remember? I never volunteered to babysit lazy children."
"Then how come Kane isn't doing this?" Thad asked.
"He's off doing the heavy lifting," Dahlia said. "Though now that you mention it, I had expected- Ah! Here he comes."
She must have sensed him in the aether, for she turned to look up the path back to the house long before he was visible through the hedges that ringed this garden. Thad reached out with his senses and found Kane's aura, as he'd expected, along with Orin's, which he had not, but even more unexpected was the patch of aether between here and there that indicated time was moving differently in this little patch of garden, and not in a good way. It was subtle - Dahlia probably hadn't noticed it - but Thad knew the signs.
"Godsdammit!" Thad growled.
Dahlia swatted him on the back of the head. "None of that here, young man! The Sisters are listening!"
Let them listen, Thad thought. If they'd been watching him work for all this time while only an hour or so had actually passed, he'd blaspheme them to their faces. He grumbled, but more quietly. He really needed to learn to control this thing.
"You say he used this orb to steer the ship?" Myron asked when the interview resumed.
"To steer the winds, yes," Lena said, patience wearing thin. "As I told you this morning." As I'm sure Thad told you as well, she added to herself.
Myron nodded toward the young woman in slim black robes who stood off to one side holding Syldra's Tear. She was a pretty thing, with dark skin and big dark eyes. A wreath of preserved flowers decorated the brim of her pointed black mage's hat, and the woven leather belt she wore was dyed a deep, rich blue. Lena guessed she was a wind mage of some sort, for her eyes glowed as she focused on the orb in her hand and a light breeze whispered through the Chamber.
She shook her head. "I get nothing from it. It's just a rock."
Other mages - wind, fire, water, and earth - nodded, muttering their agreement. All of their best and brightest, even some of the sages themselves, had studied the orbs, trying to unlock the elements hidden within.
Randell, who himself held Jack's orb, the orb of fire, held up a hand for silence. When the murmurs had faded, he said to Lena, "Tell us again about the barrier - the one on the shrine north of Cornelia. You used these to break through?"
"Yes," Lena said. Then she sighed and began describing that event again.
It was too much. Redden could see that now. A whole day studying necromancy was too much for any normal man to stomach. He pushed the book aside, bile rising in his throat.
Jack raised a questioning eyebrow at him from across the table.
"You were right, lad. That section on women with child is... something else."
Jack nodded, eyes flat as he turned back to his own studies. Redden looked across the table to the book Jack had open in front of him, the book Redden was set to read next, and saw the illustration, a detailed woodcut, though - thankfully - not in color, of the aftermath of a necromantic event.
Redden stood, rubbing his eyes, shaking himself as if he could shake off the filth of what he'd read like a dog shaking water from its coat. It made no difference - those passages would likely stick with him forever. He needed a drink. Something stronger than water. He wandered toward the corner where he'd heard Pearl kept a bottle of wine hidden in an old, hollow globe. The bottle was nearly empty, so he swigged it down, making a mental note to buy Pearl a new one. He stood a moment, looking out the window at the village street, a pretty view with plenty of flowers and trees, the leaves just starting to turn. A few fell, and he watched them drift lazily down.
He drifted just as lazily back toward his table, wandering the shelves a moment. To his surprise, he found Thad in the aetherial theory section, sitting cross-legged on the floor with a book in his lap and a few others stacked beside him.
"Weren't you meant to spend the day with Kane?" he asked the boy.
Thad didn't even look up from his book. "Aren't you meant to be studying stuff?"
Redden chuckled. "That's fair." Not wanting to return to "studying stuff," he settled himself into the floor beside Thad, looking at the book the boy held. "And what are you studying then? That hardly looks like light reading."
Thad shrugged. "It's about prophecies."
Redden leaned in for a closer look. "Oh? Feeling prophetic, are we?"
"No," the boy said, shaking his head quickly. "Not that. It's just... Prophecy? It's just reading the aether - because the aether goes through all the different times at once. It's all about time, isn't it?"
"Ah," Redden said, nodding. "You're trying to understand your own abilities."
"Dahlia had me working for hours and hours. Then Orin came and I realized it was barely lunchtime!"
Redden cringed in sympathy. "Did it again, did you?"
The boy made a face of self disgust. "I snuck off after Orin left. I thought there's got to be something in one of these books, but so far there isn't! Why can't I find anything?"
Redden sighed. "Don't let it frustrate you, Thad. As far as I know, mages have only ever used the aether's relationship to time as a source of prophecies. You might be the first to truly be able to move time around."
"But Matoya controlled time, too, right?" Thad protested. "I'm not the only one!"
"Matoya couldn't control time, son. That was just the aether reacting to her, the same way it reacts to Jack."
Thad scoffed. "That's not the same. Ice spells aren't like my time spells at all."
Redden cursed inwardly, but kept his face blank. Shouldn't have said that, he thought. That's all we need is for Thad to figure out what Jack is. The boy's smart enough to do it. "Hmm, no, you're right, of course. A silly mistake."
"Not your fault," Thad said. "You can't see it."
"Oof!" Redden said, but he smiled. "Right for the heart!"
Thad smiled back, but he did look chagrined. "Sorry."
"I can't see spells like you do," Redden said. "I only know what I've read. But, speaking of reading..." He pushed himself to his feet. "I should get back to it."
He reached down to ruffle Thad's hair but Thad dodged the gesture, looking up at him, suddenly serious. "Redden... these prophecies I'm reading about... They're not very specific."
"No," Redden said. "The aether shows possibilities, but it isn't set in stone. Anything we do in the present could change the future."
"So Jack doesn't have to be a harbinger of death?"
Redden cocked his head. "Been talking to Lukahn?"
Thad nodded.
Redden chuckled. "I wouldn't worry about Jack. From what I've gathered, Lukahn predicted that a great doom would come from Mount Gulug. Shortly afterward, some mages found Jack there, half dead on the mountainside."
"So it doesn't specifically say it's Jack?" Thad asked.
Clever lad, Redden thought, smiling. "No, not specifically. Maybe he met the great doom - maybe that's where he got his scars - but I don't think it's him, and there's nothing Lukahn can say to convince me otherwise, not after the things I've seen Jack do."
Thad nodded. "That's what I think too."
"Good," Redden said. "The rest of this village doesn't think very highly of Jack, Thad. He needs us on his side. I should get back to-"
He started to step away, but Thad tugged the cuff of Redden's trousers. "Redden? What's... What does the other prophecy say? Our prophecy?"
Redden recited the lines without thinking. He'd practically memorized the damn thing before they'd left Cornelia. "When the world is in darkness, the Warriors of Light will come."
Thad scrunched up his nose. "So it doesn't say it's us?"
Too clever by half, Redden thought. He considered his answer, knowing Thad would analyze every word. "It doesn't. The prophecy does say the warriors will each be carrying an orb, but there's nothing to indicate it's you specifically if that's what you're asking."
"So if the sages manage to get our orbs to work for them, where does that leave us?"
"Don't know," Redden said quickly, honestly. "The thought never even crossed my mind. I think it's you, Thad, the four of you. With or without the orbs."
Thad simply said, "Hmm," and looked back down at his book. Redden waited a moment longer, but apparently the boy was done with him.
Redden sighed. He scanned the shelves for a moment, looking for nothing in particular, before admitting to himself that he was stalling. He couldn't help it: he had no desire to read more about necromancy today. He decided he was done.
At last returning to the table where Jack still sat, Redden said "Let's pack it in, lad. I'm thinking we start limiting ourselves to half a day - a few hours, no more. Gods know how long we'll have to..."
He trailed off, noting Jack's expression. The young man stared down at the book in front of him, eyes pinched in anger over whatever he'd read there. He didn't seem to have heard Redden at all.
"Lad?" Redden said. He snapped his fingers in front of Jack's face. "Jack? What's wrong?"
Jack started, looking up at Redden in surprise, his blue eyes rimmed with furious tears. It seemed to take him a moment to find the words, but when he spoke, he spat out each word. "Enough. I've had enough."
The show of emotion surprised Redden, but he kept his own voice level and calm. "What is it?" he asked. "Let me see."
Jack slammed the book shut so quickly, he nearly caught Redden's fingers in it, but when the young man pushed back from the table and stalked away without a backward glance, he didn't take the book with him. A pair of scholars in his path complained as he hurried roughly past them. Redden watched him go, stunned.
Well, he thought, retaking his seat at the table. Wonder what that was about? He reached across, grabbing the book Jack had been reading, pulling it over in front of himself. Guess I can stand to read a bit more.
He'd thought he had a good idea of where Jack had been in the book, but it took him some time to find the illustration he'd seen - the book contained many, and all on a similar theme. When he did find it, he had no way of knowing how far past it Jack had read, for the lad read faster than anyone Redden had ever known. Redden skimmed the chapter headings, hoping the offensive passage would be obvious, but none appeared any worse than the things he had already seen in their studies of the subject so far. Sighing, he returned to the illustration and began reading from there, inspecting each paragraph for whatever could possibly have evoked such a reaction.
He almost missed it. When he came to the short paragraph nearly half an hour later, the information was stated so matter-of-factly, Redden almost didn't take it in.
"Despite this," he read, "there have been no reports of white mages who were born necromancers. By all accounts, the rendering of the soul that makes that transformation is self-inflicted and willingly done. Among black mages, however, this is not the case, for there have been many instances, though rare, of black mages born with souls rent asunder, the cause of which is as yet unknown. Though white necromancy is fueled by the continual breaking of the white mage's own soul, these black mages fuel their spells by breaking the souls of others. These black mages, therefore, are little more than vampires."
He read it again. He read the paragraph afterward where the author speculated what should be done with these black mages. Dark mages, Redden corrected, for that was surely what the author meant, dark mages like Jack himself.
"Oh, lad," Redden whispered. It wasn't true, of course - drawing on someone's soul hardly amounted to breaking it in that way - but when Redden considered what it must have felt like for Jack to read those words, to be compared to the horrors they'd been reading about in these books, his heart ached in sympathy. "Oh, lad, I'm sorry."
Kane was enjoying himself. Dahlia explained everything: why they trimmed branches at just this angle, why they turned the soil in just this way. She told him the names of the plants, occasionally handing him a leaf to taste or to rub between his fingers for the scent.
They took a break in the afternoon. As they'd been working so hard, Dahlia served a second lunch, and they ate it outside, sitting on the garden wall. "Don't know why I'm so hungry today," she said.
"Working hard," Kane said, shrugging. He was always hungry when he worked hard.
"You're a good worker," Dahlia said, nodding. "You've a knack for it, the gardening. I suspect you'd be an earth mage, if you were any mage at all."
"Why do you say that?" Kane asked, genuinely curious. "I can't remember half of what you've taught me."
"You may not think you do," she said, shrugging. "But you get a pass on that. There's no small amount to learn, and learning it takes years. No, it's your connection to the earth. I can sense that well enough."
Kane shook his head, chewing and swallowing before he spoke. He suspected Dahlia was the type to swat him in the head, and not gently, if he spoke with his mouth full. "No, ma'am. That's just... There's the thing with my sword."
"You mentioned that," Dahlia said, nodding. "But your sword isn't here."
Kane frowned. His sword was off with the sages now. He didn't like to be without it. Not that he thought he needed it in Miss Dahlia's garden, but that connection he'd formed with it, with the orb specifically, hummed within him even now, an ache in his chest. He could feel things he'd never felt before, things he couldn't understand. He shrugged. "I still feel it."
"Is it the sword you feel, or the aether?" she asked.
"I don't know," he said honestly. "I wouldn't know what the aether feels like."
They ate in silence for a time. Then Dahlia grabbed one last plum for herself from the basket that held their meal and hopped down from the wall. "Finish your snack. I need to grab a few things," she said, wandering off toward the corner of the garden that Kane knew held the shed where Dahlia stored her tools.
He'd just finished off the contents of the basket when she returned, carrying a huge hammer over her shoulder, the kind that Kane had heard referred to as a sledge. "We'll be moving rocks," she said with a nod of finality.
"We will?" Kane asked, eyeing the hammer. The head was as big around as one of his biceps and must have weighed four stone.
"Well, you will," Dahlia said, shifting the sledge's heavy head down to the ground before passing Kane the handle.
Five stone, he thought, amending his earlier estimation.
"Come on, then," Dahlia said, motioning him to follow her. "Leave the basket. We'll collect it on our way back."
She led him through the garden and out of it, stopping to take up her wheelbarrow before venturing onto the path that led back to the village entrance, which wasn't far. Though the village was surrounded by the lake on three sides, and forest beyond that, the fourth side boasted a view of mountains above the treetops. Where the village road led south and then east toward the docks and Kane's ship, Dahlia headed directly west away from the lake and the village, toward the mountains and trees.
The ground grew rockier as they went. Kane could see huge stones, almost boulders, peeking out between the roots of some of the massive pines. Dahlia struggled with the barrow in some places, though she grumbled when Kane tried to help. "You'll be pushing it on our way back," she told him.
They came to a break in the trees, and there Dahlia pointed out a pile of moss-covered stones. The pile was taller than Kane himself, and some of the stones in it were as large as he was. The smallest he could see was easily bigger than Shipman.
"I'm putting a wall around the vegetable patch," Dahlia said, parking the wheelbarrow, wiping her brow on the sleeve of her robe. "The deer are growing far too comfortable with it." She pointed at the massive rocks. "So I need those moved."
Kane started. "Those? You're joking! I can't move those!"
"We'll break them up first," Dahlia said, taking the hammer from Kane's unresisting fingers, "though I'll want to keep the pieces as large as we can manage."
"But... you're an earth mage! Can't you just, I don't know, make a wall?"
"Out of what? Thin air?" Dahlia snorted. "You really don't know much about magic, do you, boy?" She hefted the hammer, though it seemed far too heavy for her, and brought it down with a solid "crack" on one of the outlying stones, which broke cleanly into three pieces. "I can't make something from nothing, but I can break the stone, and I can seal it back together afterward. Which is more than I can say for you, by the way. You can move them for me, however. Come on now. Load these up... if you can manage it." She raised an eyebrow at him as she said that last, a challenge.
"Oh, I can manage it," he mumbled. He moved the barrow closer to the broken rock then bent his knees, squatting low as he got his hands around one of the pieces. It was heavy - far heavier than he expected - but not beyond the scope of his abilities. He breathed in, then lifted on the exhale and dropped the stone in the wheelbarrow with a grunt of satisfaction.
"Hmm," Dahlia said, seeming surprised, and Kane realized then that she hadn't expected him to be able to lift it. "And I thought I'd have to break them up more... Alright then. I'll keep hammering away at these. You load a couple more - not too many, mind you. It's better to make several light trips than one heavy one. And rest after each. Your muscles will go farther than your heart and lungs will. Worry about them first."
"Alright," he said, squatting beside the next stone.
When he had the barrow loaded with an amount he figured was a little less than he could handle, Dahlia walked with him back to the house, leaving the hammer behind at the rock pile. She showed him where in the garden she wanted the stones unloaded. While he emptied the barrow, she fetched a large pewter pitcher of water and placed it nearby. "Drink plenty between loads," she said.
He nodded. He was already sweating.
They returned to the rock pile. Kane filled the barrow again, leaving Dahlia behind, hammering away, as he returned to the garden to empty it. He drank the water, waited until his breath had evened out, until his heart stopped hammering, before he returned to the woods to haul away some of the stones Dahlia had broken in his absence.
They continued on in that way, neither of them speaking for the work was hard. By the third trip, Kane was soaked in sweat despite the cool and pleasant day. On the fourth, he left his shirt behind beside the water pitcher. Back at the rock pile, he noticed how hard Miss Dahlia was breathing. "You should rest too," he told her. "I'm not likely to catch up with you anytime soon."
She nodded, setting the hammer down and stepping away from it to sit beneath a tree. Kane took another trip to the house and back, and she was still sitting when he arrived, still trying to catch her breath. He filled the barrow again before he turned to her. "You could go and work on something else. I can handle this part on my own."
"Really?" she said, laughing slightly. "You think you can break those stones yourself? Made it look easy, did I?"
He shrugged. "Yeah, you did."
"Don't let the hammer fool you, boy. I've been using magic. These stones don't just nicely fall to pieces after a light tap."
Kane looked at one of the rocks. "I think I can give it more than a light tap," he said. "If I had my sword, I could slice it like a cake."
"Well, you haven't got your sword, have you?"
Kane frowned. He picked up the hammer, testing its weight. He lifted it up and gave it a few practice swings. Then he turned his attention to the rock. He focused on it, focused on that ache in his chest, felt it loosen, felt... peace. He breathed in, swinging the hammer on the exhale, aiming at a spot he could tell - could feel - would crack the stone along its weakest lines. He felt the blow land, felt it spread through him, up his arms, down his body, down through his feet and into the earth, and that massive stone, one of the largest, broke into four distinct pieces.
Dahlia sat up straight, "Sisters!" she hissed, rising to her feet. She hurried to Kane's side, putting a hand on his shoulder as she stared down at the broken rock, eyes wide. "What did you do?"
Kane shrugged. "I... I just hit it. I knew if I hit it there it would break."
"How?" she said. "How did you know? How did you...?" She looked at him, looked him up and down, head to toe, appraising. "Do it again," she said, pointing at another stone. "There. Break that one."
He nodded, stepping toward her target. Dahlia watched him as he breathed, in and out, choosing his spot, raising the hammer high. He again felt that peace, that grounding, as he brought it down.
"Sisters!" Dahlia said again.
At Kane's feet, the stone broke into thirds.
It was hours later before they let her go, well into sunset. Given how late it was, she hadn't expected Jack to be waiting for her again, not really, but still she was somewhat disappointed when he wasn't on the steps where he'd been at midday. She went around the Chamber to the library, expecting to find him buried in his studies, but the library was nearly empty, only a few scribes still there.
She went to the docks, intending to swim. Those young men were there with their machina boats; Sarda sat with them, laughing as the little devices raced out into the water and the boys had to swim out to fetch them. Farther from shore, a couple of the little row boats held children and old men fishing together as the sun gleamed golden-red on the water. It was a peaceful sight, but not as good as a swim.
She wandered up the shore a ways, toward the place where she'd sat with Jack that morning. The ashes of his fire were still there. She walked out into the water fully clothed but then she didn't swim after all - it had been a long day, yes, but not a particularly trying one - just sat in water up to her chin, listening to Sarda's laughter, the sounds of the young men's bantering voices, the calls of the birds in the undergrowth.
She stayed there no more than a few minutes - she hadn't needed more - before she walked the path back to Lukahn's house, intending to change clothes. She carried her shoes, walking barefoot, feeling the path against her feet, the cobbles near town giving way to dirt as she passed the clinic.
She was thinking - of all things - about Float, one of the white spells in her book, idly wondering how it would work to walk down this path with the spell applied to herself. The story of Alexander made it seem like she would be able to walk as though on solid ground while floating above it. She hadn't tried the spell yet as it seemed too advanced, but she'd studied the aether diagram along with all the others and for some reason, she thought of it now, tentatively shaping the aether within herself, testing it out.
She didn't get anywhere with it, except that she was completely lost in thought when she reached the house. It surprised her, therefore, when she passed the kitchen and noticed Lukahn sitting there at his table, a journal open in front of him and a quill in his hand. She stopped in the doorway as her eyes met his.
Of course, she thought. Sarda's at the lake. She had been using Sarda as a buffer, a way to avoid facing Lukahn alone. The plan had worked so well she had forgotten to be nervous about facing Lukahn at all. Those nerves came back to her now in force. The two of them kept that uncomfortable eye contact for a moment, long enough for Lena to realize she made Lukahn at least as nervous as he made her.
Eventually, Lukahn blushed and looked away. "You don't need to be afraid of me," he said.
"I'm not," she said simply.
He nodded, apparently accepting her answer as truth.
His daughter was a white mage, Lena remembered. She caught Lukahn eyeing her white hood. Is he comparing me to her?
His thoughts must have been trending that way, as Lukahn then asked, "Is the room to your liking?"
Her room, Lena thought. Iris. "Yes," she answered. "It's lovely." She was surprised at how much that pleased him. It made her feel awkward once more. She was not this man's daughter, but her own manners wouldn't let her say as much. Instead, she said, "Jack says you haven't changed it at all."
The man's mood soured so completely that Lena no longer felt the least bit polite.
"I should go," she said, stepping away from the kitchen door, toward the stairs.
Lukahn seemed surprised as he called after her, "Go? But why-"
Lena stopped, turning back, not bothering to soften her glare. "Jack is my friend," she said. "I'll not stay anywhere that even his name isn't welcome."
Lukahn's eyes widened. He stuttered, "But- but surely you've heard? The prophecy-"
Lena shook her head. She had heard all about that silly prophecy by now. "That's not Jack. You're wrong."
He opened his mouth, closed it again. Lena felt his confusion. Had he really expected to persuade her with talk of prophecy?
Yes, she realized. He's used to being believed. She recalled the way the Circle had treated them - had treated Jack - the day they arrived, the dread Jack had felt at the prospect of returning to his home. It all makes sense, she thought.
She wanted - at least, a part of her wanted - to hate the man for it, but she couldn't, not when she could see inside him and know how strongly he felt he was in the right.
There are no bad men, her father had told her once, only bad beliefs. She had thought that was true. But father was wrong. There are bad men out there. Would they find any here as they had in Melmond, she wondered? Still, Lukahn wasn't a bad man - she could sense that much.
She sighed, weary of the confrontation, weary of everything, wanting only to be away. "I'm going to bed," she said. She stepped toward the back of the house, toward the stairs.
"I saw your coming," Lukahn called after her.
She turned. He was looking at her, but he hadn't moved from the table.
"I saw the coming of my replacement," Lukahn said. "The mage who would take my place in the Circle. A mage powerful enough to pass the trial."
"Trial?" she asked.
Lukahn nodded. "In the Lake, there's an altar stone. Any mage who can lift it to the surface can request a seat in the chamber."
"That's not me," Lena said, shaking her head. "I'm a white mage."
"A strong white mage," Lukahn said. "We've not seen your like in years. Not since..." He trailed off.
Not since Iris, Lena thought, finishing for him.
"Well," Lukahn went on. "At any rate, I'm sure it's you. I saw the coming of my replacement, and here you are. The Circle won't accept my resignation until another mage presents himself - or herself. It's you. It must be you."
"It isn't," Lena said, shaking her head again.
Lukahn nodded, turning back to his journal. "Just think about what I've said."
She hurried away, stopping at the foot of the stairs when she sensed Jack. He was outside somewhere, behind the house. Not only could she feel him, but he was... sad... She passed the stairs and went out the back door.
A massive brittlewood tree stood on a grassy hill straight out the door. It was taller than the house, its trunk so thick that two grown men would have had trouble reaching around it. Jack sat on one of its gnarled roots, his back against the tree, legs long in front of him, and Lena saw that he held a book in his lap. The sun was low now. She didn't imagine he could read well in the faint light. She stepped closer, but he didn't look up, absorbed in his reading.
"Jack?" she said quietly. A creature in the bushes, a rabbit perhaps, startled and fled at the sound of her voice.
Jack, though, moved slowly. He closed the book gently, set it aside. He drew his knees up, and he looked so much smaller. She felt his sadness ebb as he tucked it away, locking his emotions down in that way he so often did. Then he looked up at her, eyes deep and soulful as they glinted with aether. She knew exactly what his frown would look like under the yellow scarf he wore. She wished she could see it. She hadn't had a good look at his face since they arrived in the village. "Lena," he said. Just that, not "my lady".
She stepped forward carefully, but he didn't move, so she moved in and sat at the base of the tree beside him. "Still studying?"
He chuckled ruefully. "My mind wouldn't let it go."
She looked at the book that sat between them. "Oh! But isn't that the book you got from Astos?"
"Yes." He sighed. "I keep thinking I'll find something in it, something that will make things better, that will make it all make sense, but..." He shrugged. "Wishful thinking. Everything I've read... it only makes things worse."
"Maybe you need different books," she said.
He looked at her sideways. "I looked at different books earlier today."
"Not those," she said quickly.
He chuckled again. He reached for her hand, squeezed it once, then let it go, wrapping his arms around his knees. "How was your interview?"
"I think they're done with me," she said, drawing her own knees up, mirroring Jack's pose. "I spent the afternoon repeating everything I told them this morning, some of it more than once, but then they started asking me about my charm - the orb - where I found it, how long ago. They've had water mages studying it, but none of them can make it do anything. I'm not sure they believe me when I tell them what we've done."
Jack nodded. "They've studied my orb before. I remember my mother using it to cast a spell - I was too young to understand how she did it - but I described it for the sages when I was a little older. They returned it to me a few days later, told me I must have been mistaken."
"It's almost enough to make me wonder if they're right. How is it that the finest mages and scholars in the world can't tell us what we're supposed to do?"
"Are we supposed to do anything?" Jack asked, leaning back, resting his head against the trunk of the tree, looking up at the branches. Lena felt the hopelessness in his next words, even if she couldn't feel it in his demeanor. "Are we supposed to believe the words of some prophecy? That we're the Warriors of Light?"
"Oh, Jack," Lena said, touching his shoulder. "You know we are. You've felt it."
He squeezed his eyes shut. "I've spent most of my life believing one of Lukahn's prophecies was wrong. If I believe this one, then..." He shook his head.
"Jack," she said, moving closer to him, intent on holding him.
"Don't," he said softly. "Please, don't."
She nodded, sitting back.
He closed his eyes, and Lena had the distinct impression he was holding back tears. "Could you... leave me alone for a time, please? I need... I need to sort some things out."
She hesitated. She wanted to protest, to say they would sort it out together, but she felt a chill - she didn't know if it was due to him or to the fact that she hadn't yet changed out of her still-damp clothes - and she remembered him Teleporting away when his feelings overwhelmed him. She decided to take herself away instead, leaving him to his thoughts.
She went inside, ignoring Lukahn, and went upstairs to Iris's room. She changed out of her wet clothes and laid in the bed, snuggling down under the colorful quilt, aware all the while that if she went to the window and parted the fluttery curtains she would see Jack out in the yard below. She didn't look.
Author's Note: 9/4/20 - I've lost all my beta readers to Covid. Not that they've died, but the changes the pandemic has brought to everyone's lives has slowly robbed them of their time to proofread for me. I've checked over the chapter several times, but you and me, readers? We're going to find all of my errors as soon as I hit publish. The publish button has magical powers that lifts the veils from our eyes, making all mistakes clear. Think kindly on me, readers. I've done my best.
By strange coincidence, this chapter takes place at around the same time of year that I'm publishing it. The work Dahlia is doing in her garden mirrors my own. The irises are ready to be cut back and divided. The lilies will have their turn in perhaps a week or two. I have a pile of mulch waiting to spread over everything I clear away. But the marigolds and cosmos are still blooming, and buds are forming on the mums. The pumpkin vines are flowering. I don't think I'm much like Dahlia, but I think she and I would get along.
One other thing I'm enjoying about Crescent Lake is its resemblance to my homeland. The place I grew up, that I've returned to now after years away, is a forested area dotted with lakes. I've modeled Crescent Lake on the many rivers and lakes I visited as a child on family camping trips. Jack's favorite tree was modeled after one of the cottonwoods in my back yard. Cottonwoods grow large and rapidly compared to other species, but they break easily - I spend the morning after every storm picking up fallen branches - thus my renaming them "brittlewoods". And, yes, there are boulders here. Plenty of them. It's not a mountainous area, but huge piles of rocks are just a part of the landscape. It's beautiful, but I hated growing up here. I thought it was too small and rural for me. I moved away as soon as I was able. But when I was away, I missed this place. I've never found anywhere that compares to it. So I came back.