The Torch that Ignites the Stars (Arcane Ascension Book 3)

by Andrew Rowe

Len nodded slowly. “An interesting way of putting things. It’s really more that the starting conditions of my creation provided me with invalid information, which I’ve taken years to attempt to rectify as fully as possible. That being said, you’re not entirely wrong — everyone who exists is mentally compromised. We all accumulate false information over time, internalize it, and are influenced by it, consciously or otherwise. We are, in part, a product of these biases, as well as all other information we gather in our lifetimes.”

  “While this is a fascinating philosophical discussion,” Sera cut in, “the more urgent issue is that you’re trying to abscond with my brother alone, for reasons you’ve been extraordinarily unclear about. You’re going to have to give us something more than platitudes and pedantry if you want there to be any chance for us to drop what we’re doing and help you.”

  Len made some sort of gesture with two fingers that I assumed was some kind of Mythralian salute or something. “Very well, I acknowledge your point. Sadly, there is no simple way for you to verify my claims. While you could return to the spire and speak to our mutual acquaintance about my nature and trustworthiness, I would prefer not to inconvenience him any further. As you are no doubt aware, I already inconvenienced him significantly simply by existing.”

  “That’s…not a very healthy way to look at your own existence.” Sera frowned.

  “Healthy or not, it’s my perspective.” Len gave Sera a smile that looked…resigned. Exhausted. “If he had not chosen to spare me, he could have taken something of far greater value from that shrine. For his sacrifice, I already owe him two life debts — for myself, and for my brother. I cannot hope to repay such a thing, but I can tell you this much: I am aware that you are under his protection. Taking any action against you would be a breach of his trust and that…that would be unthinkable to me. Assisting you in this endeavor, however, may be some small way of beginning to help repay him.”

  So far as I could tell, Len sounded genuine with that statement, and I felt a pang of sympathy for her.

  What would it be like to live knowing that your continued existence was owed so fully to someone else?

  Simply saving someone’s life in battle was significant enough, but what Keras had done was an order of magnitude beyond that: he’d given something valuable up in order to help her with no expectation of reward.

  Even seeing Len standing in front of me, I wasn’t sure if I could have made that same choice…or if it was the right one.

  “You seem sincere enough,” Sera noted, “but words are cheap. Bind.”

  There was a flash as Sera’s spell manifested, then a flickering barrier manifested in place around Len, vanishing a moment later.

  Len’s lips twitched upward in amusement. “Can’t say someone has tried that on me before. An interesting tactic, but unfortunately, not a viable one. While I would have consented to lower my Comprehensive Barrier for you to cast the spell on me, it still would have not worked. I am not of Selys’ creation, nor have I been altered by her. Your summoning contracts and bindings cannot work on me. Not without being adapted for that purpose, at any rate.”

  That was an interesting statement, if true.

  Sera shrugged. “Prove it.”

  Len shrugged a shoulder. “Very well. Dismiss Comprehensive Barrier.”

  “Bind.”

  There was a flash of light, then…

  Sera winced. “She’s right. It didn’t take. Didn’t work the way it would like if I tried it on a human, either, though.”

  Len snapped her fingers and a barrier reappeared around her. “If that’s all…”

  “It’s not.” Sera shook her head. “Researcher, I summon you.”

  Researcher appeared at her side. “Greetings, Summoner. How may I assist…oh!” Her eyes widened at the sight of Len. “Oh, hello!” She reached out with a hand immediately. “Can I touch you?”

  Len laughed and stretched out a hand. “A knowledge elemental? Curious. Go ahead.”

  Researcher gave a gleeful laugh and grabbed Len’s hand. “Oh! Oh! A corporealized crystal spirit! You’re so rare! What are you even doing out here?”

  Len raised her other hand to her lips in a quieting gesture. “Sssh. Can’t discuss everything right here.”

  “Of course, of course.” Researcher seemed to process everyone staring at her. She took a step back, cleared her throat, and turned toward Sera. “Ahem, sorry. Summoner…did you, uh, require assistance?”

  “You’ve already done a portion of it.” Sera gestured toward Len. “I needed you to verify her nature. Can you discern her magic types?”

  “Absolutely. If you’ll allow me?”

  Len nodded. “Go ahead.”

  Researcher grabbed Len’s hand again. “Let’s see…uh, spirit. Life, mental, transference, light...clarity? That’s an odd one. Travel…”

  “Good.” Sera nodded. “Can you verify some of her statements for us?”

  Researcher shook her head. “In what way?”

  “If you mean a truth detection spell, those don’t really work,” Len shook her head. “I’ve faked a number of them, believe me.”

  “Not really giving us a great deal of confidence when you say that,” Sera retorted.

  Len shrugged. “Better to be up front about this sort of thing. Elemental, I trust you concur?”

  “Hm?” Researcher blinked distractedly. “Oh, uh, yes. Can’t discern truth from lies. Not exactly. I can read physical tells with a high degree of accuracy, but a highly sophisticated spirit like…”

  “Len,” Len interjected helpfully.

  “Len,” Researcher tried, seeming to feel the name out as she spoke, “could easily have misleading or entirely missing physical tells.”

  Sera groaned. “Okay. If she was to transport Corin somewhere, would you be able to track the spell’s destination?”

  “Potentially. It depends on the range.”

  “Somewhere in the Unclaimed Lands?” Sera speculated aloud.

  Len tipped her head in acknowledgement of Sera’s supposition.

  Researcher shook her head vehemently. “No, no. I could…go with, though? Please?”

  “I wish I could take you.” Len brushed Researcher’s cheek with a hand. “You’re quite a fascinating creature.”

  “Likewise.” Researcher whispered.

  “Sadly, my mana supply is too limited to transport more than just Corin and myself to the destination in a timely fashion.”

  “What about taking an extra day to take multiple of us?” I asked.

  “Theoretically possible, but it would require camping in the middle of the Unclaimed Lands on the way. There aren’t really any safe spots to do that.”

  I nodded slowly. “What if I recharged your mana part-way with my own?”

  Len seemed to ponder that. “How much do you have available?”

  My mind immediately shot to my mana watch. I needed it to give her an accurate number. But…I could still estimate, at least. “Close to three hundred on my own.”

  “Quite impressive for your age, but unfortunately…”

  I raised a hand. “Not done. I also have several items I can drain for more mana. Hold on.” I stuck my hand in my bag.

  “Retrieve: Gray mana battery.”

  “Retrieve…” Len’s eyes widened. “You have Wrynn’s box?”

  “Uh…” I froze. “…Maybe?”

  “Hold on, give it here.” She stepped away from a disappointed Researcher to wave at me frantically.

  “…No?” I replied uneasily.

  Len gestured wildly at my bag and the box within it. “Do you know what that thing is capable of? We could summon Wrynn!”

  I winced. “It isn’t charged.”

  “…Oh.” Her shoulders slumped. “Apologies, I got excited. But wait, why haven’t you just recharged it? You’re an Arbiter.”

  “Different type of runes. They’re not from around here, so I didn’t want to risk breaking them.”

  Len blinked. “Oh. Oh. Yo
u don’t know how to interact with Artinian or Mythralian items. Of course.” She clapped her hands together. “Easily solved. Agree to come with me, and I’ll teach you how to recharge the box.”

  I hesitated.

  That was sorely tempting, but recharging the box and summoning Wrynn actually meant that I’d probably lose access to the item sooner. I didn’t want to admit that, though. “I’ll…take that into consideration.”

  She must have noted my hesitation. “I’d be willing to teach you a bit about the how the runes work in general. Not enough to duplicate it — you’d need Artinian spirit arts to copy it completely — but useful theory.”

  That was almost worth losing the box earlier, but it still didn’t resolve the core problem. “I’ll take you up on that if I decide to go. Now, I have some items here that I could drain in order to potentially give you back more mana. A few hundred more, at least.”

  “Of what variety?”

  “Mostly gray, some transference.”

  “Hm.” She paused, seemingly doing some mental calculations. “How quickly do the items recharge?”

  “An hour, under ideal conditions, but in the Unclaimed Lands…”

  “Oh, they’re ambient recharge based? Interesting. Not good for our situation, but a good approach for spires. Hm.” She nodded. “Okay. There’s a way we might be able to bring one more person, but it takes some small risks.”

  “Define small risks.” Sera folded her arms.

  “I teleport us part way through the Unclaimed Lands to one of the sword shrines. Corin uses his mana and the batteries to recharge me. We wait for a few hours, and Corin recharges me as many times as necessary to give me twenty-four hundred additional mana. With that, I would be able to take two people with me for the rest of the journey. Corin and one other.”

  “And the risk is that the shrine may be dangerous?” Sera asked.

  “It’s more that the area outside the shrine may be dangerous,” Len replied. “A number of factions have set up camps outside some of the shrines. I know some that were unoccupied outside last time I visited, but it’s been months. If, for example, the Tails of Orochi decided to make camp outside the shrine…”

  “Yeah, that’d be bad.” I frowned. “Could you teleport us away quickly if we ran into anyone?”

  “I could save enough mana for an emergency, or you could refresh my mana as much as possible before the last teleport jump to the shrine. That might be enough to get away in an emergency, it might not. I’m willing to take the risk of encountering them if you are insistent upon bringing someone else along. Just be aware that this does introduce an extra layer of risk in exchange for the security of bringing a companion.”

  “Can we have a moment to discuss it?” I asked.

  “Of course.” Len nodded.

  “In private?”

  “Ah. Yes, forgive me.” Len bowed her head. “I’ll give you a bit of space.”

  Len wandered off a short distance. Researcher glanced from-side-to-side, then surreptitiously followed Len a few moments later.

  The rest of us formed a circle to talk. “Unless anyone has a compelling reason to refuse, I think I’m going.” I noted.

  “Obviously.” Sera jerked a thumb at Len. “She hooked you perfectly. Too perfectly. Let’s get this out of the way — one of us is going with you. It’s just a question of which.”

  I frowned. “Not sure I agree. Len seems like she’s probably who she says she is, and if she is, stopping at the shrine may add more danger than an extra body would remove.”

  “How powerful do you think she is?” Sera asked me.

  I activated Detect Aura and glanced aura. It showed precisely nothing. I turned back to Sera. “Detect Aura doesn’t get anything. She’s either suppressing heavily or just not an attuned. Probably the latter: presuming her story has any truth to it, she’d be classified as a non-spire monster, and we know those don’t generally have shrouds. That makes it hard to evaluate her threat level.”

  Sera nodded. “About what I expected. Let’s think of it this way, then. Threat level wise, she was dangerous to Keras when he first arrived on the continent. He estimated himself as somewhere in the Citrine range. Even assuming she hasn’t improved at all over the last however many years it’s been — which I find unlikely — she’s probably around Citrine. On the off chance she means to do something you wouldn’t like, you can’t handle her alone. Two against one against a Citrine would be tremendously dangerous for us, but not impossible.”

  “Depends on the Citrine, but fair.”

  “Beyond that, she’s taking you to meet with someone else, and that someone might be hostile even if she isn’t. And even if neither of them means you harm, there’s still all the threats of the Unclaimed Lands…and, moreover, politics. If you’re being sent to do diplomatic work on your own, well, that’s its own risk.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Thanks, Sera. Always appreciate your love and trust.”

  “Hey, just being honest. We all know you don’t like dealing with politics.”

  “Got a point there,” Patrick chimed in. “For an Arbiter, you’re not really much for, well, arbiting.”

  “Think the word yer lookin’ for is arbitration,” Mara corrected.

  “Right, that.”

  I sighed. “Okay. So, fine. Presuming I agree to bring one of you, any volunteers?”

  “I’m your retainer. It’s my responsibility to accompany you into danger.” Patrick smiled. “And I wouldn’t mind seeing one of those sword shrines…maybe if we’ve got the time, I could even try the tests?”

  “Possible, but we’re probably too weak for that.” I paused. “Except for Mara. At Sunstone, she’s probably got a decent shot.”

  “Talked to Keras ‘bout that a bit. I think it depends on the shrine. Not all of ‘em are even all that dangerous. More puzzles, less fighting. Wouldn’t mind a jaunt out there, and I’d be glad to back you up if you need it.”

  “That just leaves me, then.” Sera nodded. “I will, of course, go with you if that’s your preference. Combat wise, I’m frankly still the weakest option of us for the moment, especially after what I just did. I probably shouldn’t use mana for another day or so. But if there’s a sensitive political matter to handle, I believe I’d be the best equipped to handle it.”

  I nodded slowly, considering.

  We talked about the options for a little longer, weighing each option carefully.

  Then finally, I made my choice, dramatically pointing my finger. “Sera, I choose you.”

  “Good.”

  I turned to the others. “I value you both, but honestly, I need the diplomatic help more than I need assistance in a fight right now.”

  “Makes sense!” Patrick grinned. “Don’t worry, we’ll be fine here. Maybe we’ll even take another jaunt into the tower?”

  “Think I’m due a break.” Mara grimaced. “Those elixirs might not have hit me as hard as most, but I think they’re catchin’ up on me a bit.”

  “Fair. Winter Festival, then?”

  “Winter Festival it is.” Mara grinned.

  With that, Patrick turned back to me. “Just, uh, make sure Len can get you back here in time for us to take the train home?”

  …I hadn’t considered that.

  With the decisions made, I went back to Len. “Sera and I will both go with you.”

  “Excellent choice.” Len clapped her hands together, then turned to Researcher. “Perhaps you can rejoin us once we reach our destination, then?”

  “Oh, I would be delighted!” Researcher chimed. “Summoner, if you wouldn’t mind calling me once you get there?”

  “We’ll have to see what this Mysterious Unclaimed Lands Entity out there wants first, but probably.” Sera gave Researcher a smile. “Just stick with these two until I call you, then.”

  “Of course!” Researcher bowed her head gratefully.

  “Quick check — can you get us back here after you’re done?” I asked Len.

  “Yes,
I can provide transportation back, although we would still need to stop mid-way to rest at a mana-rich locale. I could also potentially teleport you to a train station without needing to stop — the area we’re going to is closer to a railway than it is to Caelford.”

  I nodded. “We can make that decision later. Patrick, Mara, please feel free to take the train that we’re scheduled for if you don’t hear from us. If we don’t meet you here, we’ll plan to meet you in Valia instead.”

  “Understood.” Patrick nodded.

  We spent a few more minutes to discuss logistics, then we got started.

  “You’ll need to hold my hands for the teleportation process,” Len explained. “It’s going to take several ‘jumps’. I have significant range, but nowhere near enough to get us all the way to our destination at once. After each jump, if the area looks clear, we’ll take a brief break to help recover from teleportation sickness. Are you ready?”

  “Ready,” we confirmed.

  We reached out and each took one of Len’s hands. It was easier for me to make contact when I initiated it, and I knew it was just for the purposes of a spell.

  “Superior Teleportation,” Len spoke aloud.

  Then Caelford faded away in a blur, and I found myself elsewhere.

  ***

  I’d pictured the Unclaimed Lands as being sort of a barren, desert region. Sparse brush, dry air, maybe some cacti or something.

  To my credit, there were areas of the Unclaimed Lands like that — notably the blackened sands near the Fire Temple. But the area where we appeared was very, very different.

  We found ourselves in the midst of a forest glade. The trees around us formed a perfect circle. We’d appeared on top of some kind of stone platform etched with foreign runes. A small crystal hovered in mid-air above the platform.

  With the forest line being hundreds of feet away from us, I had a clear view of a perfectly clear blue sky above us. The air wasn’t dry in the slightest: it was, perhaps, the cleanest and purest air I’d ever breathed.

  I might have appreciated the beauty of it more if I wasn’t immediately sick to my stomach. I’d been teleported on many occasions before, but never anywhere close to this distance.

  With great effort, I kept myself from vomiting on the teleportation platform. As it was, I barely managed to wobble for a moment, then force myself into a sitting position. Sera hastily did the same.