“Marten!” Hana exclaimed as she jumped down from the wagon. She grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him back, although it was clear he had already finished what he intended to do.
“It’s alright, Hana. I deserved that,” I said, rubbing my jaw reflexively.
“You’re damn right you did,” Marten remarked under his breath.
“That doesn’t matter!” Hana said sharply, scolding us both. “We can’t be fighting when we have soldiers following us!”
“There won’t be any soldiers. At least not tonight,” I explained. “I’ll keep watch, just to be sure, but I think we’re safe to pull the wagon off the road and rest until morning.”
Marten and Hana shared a quick series of microexpressions that could only be developed over years of marriage, then looked back to me and nodded in sync. Marten returned to the front of the cart, while Hana motioned for me to follow her. “Lux, I’m worried about Lia. She was helping me tend to Marin’s injuries, but she passed out suddenly when she was fiddling with the strange device you handed her.”
I winced at the mental image. “That would be my fault. I’m sorry if I’ve caused you worry; Lia is perfectly fine, apart from being overtired. I’ll do what I can to make sure she recovers quickly.” I stepped in through the cloth flaps and lowered a hand to help Hana up after me. “If Lia passed out, that means that you treated Marin’s wounds yourself, correct?”
“That’s right,” she answered softly. “The cut on her arm should heal without issue, but I’m worried about the wound to her chest. Lia told me she would heal it once the bolt was removed, but she fainted before she had a chance.”
My face paled as I realized the severity of Marin’s condition far later than I should have. When I pulled back the borrowed shirt, I could see that her fresh bandages were already beginning to soak through with blood, and her caramel skin had a sickly pallor. “You did a good job wrapping this,” I murmured to Hana absentmindedly as I traced the makeshift bandages with my finger. “She’d be a lot worse off right now without your help.”
I let out a slow breath and closed my eyes as I channeled mana down my arm to inspect the damage beneath her wrapping. Marin had been extremely lucky, apart from being shot in the first place; the bolt had entered a mere two inches away from both her heart and her lung, avoiding any life-threatening injuries. The squared metal head had left a notch in the side of her collarbone where it had initially impacted, and I felt a pang of guilt as I finished my assessment. I should’ve just made you leave.
The healing rune inside my ring flashed, and a thin trail of sparkling green energy wound out from beneath her bandages and made its way towards her injured arm. Her bolt wound began to stitch itself together from the bottom up, removing any trace of the injury. I felt the gap in her collarbone fill itself in with new bone, and then the drain on my mana halted as the spell completed. Opening my eyes, I reached for the knot at the top of her shoulder and gently tugged it loose.
Hana sucked in a loud breath behind me as I began to unwind the bandage, but she made no move to stop me. With the tight strip of cloth removed, I peeled back the soiled pad of fabric that had pressed against the wound, letting out a sigh of relief when my eyes confirmed what my mana had shown me. Apart from the excessive amount of half-dried blood that stained her bare chest, there was no other indication she had ever been hurt. I quickly buttoned the top button of the overlarge shirt she wore, then sat back against a crate.
“A miracle from the Prime of Life,” Hana intoned with an awed whisper, checking over Marin’s condition herself.
“No, nothing like that,” I said, waving her away, “it was just a…” I trailed off, remembering the first conversation in which I had told Lia that all magic wasn’t a divine blessing. I don’t need that on top of everything else. “Uhm, regardless of what it was, Marin will be fine. She’s still missing a lot of blood, so we’ll have to make sure she drinks plenty of water and eats well over the course of our trip.”
The wagon rumbled forward slowly as Marten pulled ahead, and after a minute of travel he found a flat spot sufficient to hold us for the night. Before I left the wagon, I knelt down to check on Lia. Her hands were still clutched tightly around the mana needle and orbs, one of which was half full with a dull orange liquid. I gently extricated the equipment and returned it to my bandolier.
Observing her through Detection was a disquieting sight; her warm, golden aura was entirely absent, leaving her as a grayscale body against the neon backdrop of my mind. The rise and fall of her chest was easily noticeable, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that she looked like a corpse. I put a hand to her cheek to brush away a loose strand of hair and found her skin warm, which comforted me enough to move on with the night’s business. I knew that without my intervention, she would most likely sleep for at least a day, if not longer; for the time being, the fact was a blessing.
I followed Hana out into the roadside clearing. It was a clear, cold night as the sky faded from dark purple to black, and the moon hung low and full, providing us with ample light to work: Marten hitched the horse to a nearby tree, Hana sorted through a small bag of food to prepare us dinner, and I pulled three crates from the wagon to use as seats. We all came together when our jobs were complete and ate a quiet meal of road provisions. I removed my sword belt and the heavy gauntlets I had taken from the King’s Strength, placing them carefully on the ground before settling into a cross-legged position on my crate to wait for the questions to come.
Marten was the first to break the silence. “So,” he said, drawing out the word as he stared into his tin cup of thin ale. The clearing around us faded back into silence as he failed to finish his thought.
“You can ask me anything,” I prodded, “either of you. Rest assured, Lia already knows everything there is to know about me. She hasn’t been traveling with a stranger this whole time, I promise.” I looked between the two of them. “I’ll answer any question you ask honestly. Whether you choose to believe me is entirely up to you.”
Another moment passed as they both considered the information. “It’s been clear you aren’t actually from Doram since we first met,” Hana said eventually. “We didn’t press the issue before, but...I’d like to know now.”
“That’s right. I’m not actually from anywhere, at least in this world.” Hana and Marten’s eyebrows raised in unison. “About a week before Lia was taken, I appeared outside the walls of Yoria. I can’t explain how or why it happens exactly, apart from the fact that I have almost no control over it happening. Counting where I was born, this is the fourth world I’ve been to.”
Hana didn’t flinch at the unbelievable story. “How long will you be in our world before you leave again?”
“Using my last two experiences as a guide, I would say somewhere between seven and eighty years.”
“Eighty?” she asked, incredulously. “How old are you, Lux?”
“If I’m correct in my assumptions, I’m twenty-seven years old again. However, if you count all of the time I’ve been alive in other worlds, I’m well over one hundred by now.” The stunned silence that ensued gave me an opportunity to continue uninterrupted. “My real name isn’t Lux, by the way, although I would prefer if you continue to use it to address me. My birth name is Elden Graham, but I haven’t gone by that name for a long time.”
Hana gave me a small nod. “How did you heal Marin’s injury? Do you have a special connection to the Primes?”
“Err, no, I don’t,” I said, scratching the back of my head as an excuse to look away and plan my next words more carefully. “Every world I’ve been sent to has had magic in some form, but each one has had a different way of interacting with it. In your world, it’s through prayer to the Primes, but that isn’t the only way. My past experiences give me a...unique perspective on magic, which has allowed me to learn some incredible things.”
“Is that why the King put you in jail, and sent his men after you? Because of your abilities?”
�
��Yes, and no,” I said, tilting my head. “I was originally imprisoned for defending myself against a pair of robbers in the city. Between that, and the means of my escape from the dungeon, the King decided I would be a useful tool to solve problems in an ‘off the record’ capacity.” My eyes fell as I continued. “Unfortunately, his efforts to persuade me to work for him included threatening you. Which is why we’re in the situation we’re in now. Which I’m very sorry about.”
“Everything that we’ve gone through in the past month happened because you chose to save Marlia,” Hana said softly. “While it’s true that your actions brought us to this situation, our family would be much worse off without you. Given the choice, I would give up everything we own in exchange for Lia every time.”
“Thanks, Hana. That means a lot.” I coughed away the beginnings of an emotional lump in my throat, then looked at Marten. “You’ve been uncharacteristically quiet tonight, Marten. You must have something you want to know.”
“She’s the real brains of the operation,” he said, tipping his head towards Hana. “I’ve only got one question for you: what are your intentions with our daughter?”
I couldn’t help but smile; despite being told that I had amazing magical powers and had lived multiple lives, his biggest concern was still his daughter’s happiness. “I made Lia a promise that I would take her to see the world, and I plan to keep it. Wherever she wants to go, whatever will make her happy...that’s what will make me happy. For as long as she’ll have me, anyway.”
“You know, there’s a word for that,” Marten said, arching an eyebrow at me. “Marriage.”
I chuckled. “I was married once, two lifetimes ago. Amaya was a wonderful woman.” A wave of nostalgia washed over me, and I had to fight off the urge to watch my memories with her in my head for the thousandth time. “I hope she’s still out there, somewhere. I never got a chance to say goodbye before I was sent to a different world.”
Even in the silvery moonlight, I saw Marten’s face turn deathly pale. “Lux, I’m...I’m sorry. If I had known, I would never have given you such a hard time before. I’m—”
“No, wait,” I cut him off, waving my hands, “I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad! It’s just...whenever I think of her, back in her world, I just want to know that she’s happy, whatever that means. I want to know that she isn’t bitter and lonely like I was, and that she found someone that loves her.” I laughed suddenly, taken aback by how foolish I had been. “Knowing all that, I never even considered giving myself the same option. I thought it would tarnish her memory if I found my own happiness that didn’t include her. But that’s not what she would want; she would want me to be loved, too. It took me way too long to realize that.”
I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand before the tears that had formed could fall. “I guess that was a rather long winded way of saying yes; I don’t know the customs of Kaldan, but I intend to marry your daughter.” A warm, fuzzy feeling spread outwards from my chest, and a wide smile spread across my face. “She doesn’t know that yet, though. That’s a conversation for after things settle down a bit.”
Hana crossed the space between us and pulled me into a tight hug. “We would be honored to have you join our family.”
Marten followed up close behind her. “Not that we don’t consider you family already,” he chuckled, clapping me on the shoulder. “I knew you were a good man the first time we met, Lux. I know you’ll make Lia happy.”
“Thanks, both of you,” I said, returning Hana’s hug. The strength and warmth of her motherly love washed over me, and I realized I had come to desperately miss the feeling of safety and belonging it gave me; I had lost the last of the real memories of my birth family decades ago. I lingered in her arms for a few seconds longer, then pulled away and stood up from my crate.
“I’d appreciate it if you would keep what we talked about between us. Lia knows everything already, but Marin doesn’t. For her sake, I’d like to keep it that way,” I explained.
“Of course,” Hana answered. “Your secrets are safe with us.”
Marten nodded in agreement, then took his wife’s hand. “It might not feel like it now, but you saved us again today, Lux. Thank you for keeping my family safe.” He wiggled his eyebrows at me. “Or, should I say, our family?”
“Our family,” I replied with a smile. “Speaking of keeping us safe, I’m going to go walk a patrol around camp. Not that I think we’re in any danger, just...old habits, I suppose.”
“I’ll clear you a space to sleep in the wagon before you get back,” Hana offered.
“No need; I’m going to keep watch tonight,” I said, reequipping my belt and gauntlets. “I can sleep while we travel during the day. At least, once Lia is awake. I’ll be much more comfortable knowing someone is always watching our perimeter.”
Hana looked concerned, but she didn’t press the issue. We said our final goodnights and parted ways; they returned to their wagon, while I walked out to the road to begin my wide lap around the camp. Although it was true that I was more comfortable keeping watch, my real motivation for going on patrol was to spend some time alone with my thoughts. The events of the past day were almost too innumerable to process, and I had a hard time believing they hadn’t played out over the course of a week instead of twelve hours.
I walked until the wagon was out of sight, obscured by a small thicket of trees, then sat down in the center of the road. The night had turned particularly cold after sunset, and I wrapped the warming cloth of my cloak tighter to fight off the chill. After a few seconds of fidgeting to get comfortable, I took a deep breath and expanded the small radius of Detection I was holding outwards with a burst of energy. The world quickly grew to a vast circle of glowing lights, and I lost myself among the details.
When my mind was settled comfortably after the influx of information from my surroundings, I began to sort through my memories with as much reason and calm as I could muster. Val betrayed us. It was an unfair assessment of the situation rooted in emotion; based on what Virram had said, Val had kept her word and left out the specific details that would have caused us trouble, but the information had reached the King through other sources. She had clearly been conflicted about carrying out Virram’s order, and although I had no evidence to prove it, it seemed as though she had ordered her men to attack me to protect Lia. Had the orders been reversed, the other Trinity Guards would have quickly overwhelmed Lia without my intervention.
Savitz tried to kill Marin. It was difficult to reconcile my idea of Savitz against the actions he had taken. All of the interactions Lia and I had had with him during our imprisonment were surprisingly pleasant, and he had shown some modicum of compassion for us despite the clear disgust his men viewed us with. However, his actions began to make sense when I took Virram into consideration; Savitz had no reason to doubt whatever terrible stories the King had told him about us, and the dead Trinity Guards in the throne room combined with the shattered sigil window would back up any atrocities we were purported to have committed. It was possible that Savitz had taken the attack personally, believing that I had betrayed the trust he had initially put in me, and had used the emotion to justify the orders Virram had given him.
Virram threatened Lia’s parents. The thought sat unanswered as I tried to approach it from different angles, searching for some rational reasoning. No. There’s no justification for that. Virram had shown that his actions weren’t taken for the good of his country, but for the good of his own self-interest. Planning an invasion of his own capital, sending his most dedicated guard away to her potential death, using his subjects as leverage; there was no explanation that would make his actions excusable.
I took a deep breath to recenter myself before moving on. I’m going to ask Lia to marry me. Just as it was a struggle to keep my anger from flaring up when thinking about Virram, it was similarly challenging to hold back my tingling excitement about the prospect of marrying Lia. I knew that I would have to find a time to talk wi
th Hana in private to learn the Kaldanic marriage traditions and what would be expected of me, both in terms of my proposal and as a husband. It was strange to be thinking so specifically of the future after the morning had held so much uncertainty, but the feeling of hope was much more enjoyable than the usual lingering anxiety I held in the back of my mind.
While it was a simple exercise to identify the proper responses to the day’s events, it was a much more difficult task to accept them. Whenever Val’s face appeared in my memories, I couldn’t shake the feeling of betrayal that burned deep within my gut, and despite the clear necessity of my actions, I was still saddened by Savitz’s death. The only constant that remained clear in my mind was my hatred of King Virram, and even still, I felt conflicted; while it would have been the ultimate catharsis to finally kill him for what he had put me through, I knew that the innocent citizens of Kaldan would end up suffering more than I had for his death. I will not be made a kingslayer again.
Movement in the wagon refocused my attention on the real world, and I looked to find Marten and Hana carefully stepping around Marin and Lia as they rose for the day. I cracked one eye open and was surprised to find the sky vibrant and pink on the horizon; while I was sure I had been conscious for the entire night, my perception of time was clearly warped by my intense meditation. There was a persistent ache in my knees as I stood up from my cross-legged position in the dirt, and I went through a long series of stretches before returning to the camp.
Before I could join the Corells for breakfast, a loud shriek rang out from the back of the wagon. I dashed ahead and lunged inside just in time to see Marin writhing backwards in panic, clawing at the spot where the bolt had pierced her chest. Her empty eyes scanned around the wagon as her mind struggled to reconcile her last memories with her current situation.
Restart Again: Volume 3 Page 4