by Quil Carter
A flicker of anxiety came to his chest, but he pushed it away with another mouthful of rabbit. Falling into the river had been terrifying, he was probably going to develop a nice healthy paranoia of heights from now on, he suspected.
No. Ben pushed it from his mind. He couldn’t think of it, not right now. He was safe and should be okay. Eventually in Birch he would meet back with Teal and Malagant and continue to Garas.
Ben thought of their reunion. Teal would probably cry, Malagant might too. Heck, he himself probably would. Teal would break his legs and swear to never let him out of his sight. Malagant would hug him until his ribs broke…
Ben sighed and laid his head onto the furs. The violet flames danced, licking the green hills behind them. The fire reflected and disbursed the sun like it was made of crystal. Little purple rainbows of all shades shone on everything. Against the wooden cart, the canvas bags, even colouring Jonquil’s silver sword. It must look beautiful at night, especially with the borealis that was getting more and more vivid the further north they got. It must be breathtaking in the Frey.
The cart gave a jolt, and he would hear Jonquil giving out an almost cartoonish mocking cry as he talked to the mule. Ben smiled. His new friend seemed like good company. He certainly did luck out.
Ben gave another hacking cough into his sleeve and sniffed his nose. He closed his eyes and moved next to the fire, and let his mind wander as they continued on their way.
Ben slept on and off for the rest of the day, night came earlier to the Lazarius Plains since it was still technically winter (with the sun beaming down on him however it didn’t seem like it) so Jonquil had made little balls of silver light and put them into lanterns; he centered them in front of the cart to try and light their way.
Ben found himself talking a lot more openly than he probably should have to the merchant. Although he left out that they were prophecy walkers, he told him all about Malagant and Teal and their journey to Birch, and then after that, Newvark. He indulged him with stories of squirrel hunting, encountering the jare cat, and even getting caught in the snowstorm in Lelan Hold.
The merchant told him stories back. He was a wonderful storyteller, but most of his tales were old Alcovian stories he had picked up from travelling. From what Ben gathered he was an Alcovian elf, hibrid crossbreed. Born in the Frey but had travelled all over Al’Anea. He had family in the Frey, but travelled alone with his mule. Ben hadn’t been the first traveller he had picked up for company and assured him he wouldn’t be the last.
Eventually the two of them made camp, or Jonquil did, he had ordered Ben to stay in the cart and mind the meat he had put on for their dinner. Jonquil had directed their cart to an old abandoned auchtrhall, without even four walls to hold it together. It was nothing but a shell of carved stone statues and worn bricks, all being taken back by the green grass of the plains. Ben had passed a few of these stone structures as they had carried on; it seemed all of them were eventually reclaimed by the grass and soil.
Ben made himself a nice little nest beside the eroded carving of an elf holding a large book. It was standing tall on a pedestal, looking proudly at the stars around him. The green aurora was in the sky again, no longer broken up by trees or mountains. The stars and night sky stretched out over the plains as far Ben couldn’t see, until the grass and rock started again. Everything just looked like stars and night.
Ben inhaled sweet grass and held his furs against him. The vial of painkillers Jonquil had given him to hold onto numbed him nicely. Not quite as good as the old world stuff, but it was a god’s sent compared to the intolerable pain he was used to.
Jonquil was sitting on a carved stone, dotted with rough moss and clumps of grass. Behind him, the remains of a stained glass window, still intact but faded from the sunlight. His boots were steaming as he held them against the purple flames and his eyes flickered as he softly hummed to himself, warming his hands against the fire.
As he watched this peaceful scene, Ben closed his eyes, wondering what his friends were doing on this night. He hoped they were safe, he hoped they were coping.
Soon… soon he would be back in Birch.
The next afternoon found Ben feeling a world better. He woke up and took a deep breath with a clear nose. His lungs didn’t crack as much as they had as well, and he could sense his energy start to come back. Slowly though, he was still weak, but he was feeling better with every meal, and with every nap.
“You’ll like this,” Jonquil said with a smile. He pointed ahead to a rather steep hill, the side of it a sheer rock face. “A spring, the Gale Hot Springs. Don’t mind me saying, Ben, but you stink of death.” The elf chuckled and flicked the mule’s reins. Gummy shook his head, twitched his long ears and lurched himself forward. The cart groaned and started making its way uphill. The canvas sacks of apples and supplies behind them shifting around from the incline.
“Hot springs?” Ben said curiously. He stood up and tried to get a look at the other side of the hill. With a closer look he could see wisps of smoke swirl against the blue sky. No, not smoke, steam.
When the mule drove the cart to the side of the rock face, the hot springs came into view.
On the side of the rocky precipice Ben looked below to see several large pools of steamy water, all of them an oddly bright blue colour. Surrounding the rippling pools were moss-covered rocks, pocked with rough white flecks and bits of weed, seemingly even brighter with the constant feed of water. Bits of brush plants also speckled the pools, with small blue flower buds in the middle of dark green wax leaves.
As a whole, the pools looked inviting and from the heat distorting the cooler air around it, they looked hot as well.
“Oh, damn, that looks nice,” was all Ben could manage. A moment later a small yellow brick flew over his head, breaking up the glassy blue surface.
“There’s your soap. Get clean, and wash your filthy clothes. I may be taking care of you, but I’ll be damned if I’ll play maidmother,” Jonquil chuckled. Ben didn’t have to be told twice, he stripped off his clothing and got into the hot water.
It was painful for a moment, Ben found he had a lot more injuries on his body than he had suspected. The hot water found every single one of them and burned his exposed flesh as it did. Ben gasped, but endured. Soon enough, the burning just felt nice.
Ben took a deep cleansing breath of the hot steam, and dunked his head under the water, staying there until he ran out of breath. No other time in his life has he ever wished he was a daraphin; he could live in these hot springs.
After soaking his clothes he started to scrub himself clean. Layers of dirt, mucus, and gods knows what else came off of him as he soaked. He was sure a vile pool of body fluid and dead skin was probably surrounding him. He hoped the next elf to use the springs wouldn’t notice. He felt like a walking corpse.
He scrubbed and scrubbed for over an hour. And after trying his best to wash his clothes, he scrubbed himself some more. He could hear Jonquil behind a cluster of rocks, putting food on and tending to Gummy, probably wondering just why his friend was taking so long. He would understand once he saw the discoloured water around Ben from all the dirt and gross.
When Ben finally felt like a hibrid again and not a cadaver, he got out of the pool and pulled the fur cloak Jonquil had lent him over himself. He walked into Jonquil’s camp and hung up his jerkin, trousers, and underclothes.
“Hey, you’re a hibrid!” Jonquil exclaimed in mock surprise.
Ben laughed and nodded. “I’m about as surprised as you. I hope I smell better?”
“Like bloody flowers now. You smelled like a four day old rotten body. Surprised I didn’t find a maggot on you.”
“I wouldn’t have been surprised.” Ben sat down; he wrung the bottoms of his trousers beside the violet fire. “I feel living, finally.” He sat down and took a drink from his wineskin; he let the furs drop to his lap as he dried himself off by the fire. “Say, Jonquil, why is this fire violet? I’ve only been able to make norm
al fire from my palm. Is it a different magic?” He guessed it might have been a mage trick from another race, but Jonquil was half hibrid, half Alcovian.
Jonquil held out his hand, he gave his long elven fingers a twitch and a rather large fireball puffed from his palm. “This isn’t firepalm my friend, this is silvermagic. Firepalm will never be more than a puff of flame to light a fire. Runeflame can burn your enemies to a crisp.” The elf smirked; Ben could see a glint in his eye as he looked at Ben. “You… you’re very magical, do you know that?”
Ben looked at him bewildered. “I am?”
Jonquil nodded. “You have incredibly magical blood in you. What do you know so far?”
Ben was proud of himself for keeping a straight face. It was, of course, impossible for him to tell his friend that he came from the most un-magical of stock possible, so he just shook his head. “I didn’t know my parents, but it was pulling teeth to get to firepalm which is all I know. I assumed I was just, well… bad at it.”
Jonquil grabbed Ben’s hand and rested his fingers against it. “My friend, concentrate.”
With his eyes wide, Ben watched as Jonquil made a puff of purple flame come from his fingertips and transfer onto Ben’s palm. “Hold it.”
Ben found himself sucking in a breath; he tried to gather his energies to hold the flame in his hand. A few seconds later the flame turned a brilliant blue colour. It took all of Ben’s concentration to not drop it. This flame was different, it felt stronger than firepalm. Almost seeping energy and heat, like it was its own little glowing star.
Surprisingly, Jonquil laughed and clapped his hands together. “He did it, he works!” the elf exclaimed.
Ben tensed his fingers and focused on it more.
“Make it bigger, gather yourself. It’s the maegic, that’s what you feed it,” Jonquil whispered. The blue of the flames were bright in the elf’s eyes; he had never seen the merchant look so excited than he did watching Ben with the flame.
Ben stared at it; he flicked his fingers, making blue flares shoot up to the sky like the flicking tongues of snakes. In spite of himself, he moved the blue flame to his other hand and also set it on fire. He stood there, a smile on the corner of his mouth as he made the flames flare and flutter. They made ripples and waves on the rocks behind them, bathing the green grass in cold light.
Ben gazed at the transfixing blue light, before he decided to extinguish it. Though to his shock when he closed his fists the flames didn’t go out, they just coated his hands.
Panic over took Ben’s reasoning, he started to try and shake the flames out.
Jonquil ducked as several large fireballs shot from Ben’s hands as he shook them. Ben yelped in surprise, his concentration breaking. The fireballs flew across the plains like comets, one even hitting the rock wall behind them, breaking off several pieces of compressed sediment and rock. With his concentration broken the flames went out.
As the rock and dirt rained down on them, Jonquil let out a nervous laugh.
“Oh, that’s one way to do it. Don’t shake the fire, you nitwit!” he chuckled, shielding his head. Ben looked at his hands bewildered.
“How did you make me do that?” he asked surprised. Just days ago he had only managed firepalm, now he was brandishing blue flares of fire that were obviously used as weapons rather than fire starter.
“Me? No, my friend. I got you started. As soon as those flames turned blue, that was all you,” Jonquil said. “Blue is your colour then, eh?”
I am the sapphire pendant carrier… Ben said to himself, but he just nodded. “I always liked that colour.”
The merchant grinned, little flames erupted from his fingers; he made them dance across them. “By the shores of Darancove, the rocky hills of Evercove, the trees of Alcove, the sands of Dashavia, and the mighty mountain of Cilandil – you are exactly what I expected.”
Ben made the same blue flames roll across his hands as well. He looked at the merchant. “What do you mean?”
The merchant thought for a moment, making the purple flames jump into the air like fleas. “Let us just say, my friend. I can smell potential, and I must say… you come from silverblood. I will teach you, until we get to Birch. As long as you do something for me.”
Ben stared at him, his eyes narrowed. “Okay,” he said slowly.
“Do not ask me how I know this.”
41
Malagant watched Teal sharpen his seeve dagger. He had already sharpened Talon and Cyan to a razor’s edge and now he was moving on to Malagant’s knives and arrows. He hadn’t gotten out Ben’s sword yet, perhaps he was avoiding it, or maybe he just wasn’t satisfied with the other weapons yet.
His unbrushed gold and red hair was hanging over his face; it was almost down to his nose now. His green eyes, distant and cold, were transfixed on the whetstone and the dagger, and his mouth was a thin line. There was no tongue sticking out of the corner, like he usually did when he was concentrating. No… that was Teal who did that.
This wasn’t Teal.
He had lost him; this Malagant had accepted the night after the prophecies had told them to move on. He had heard his Teal give one last heart-shattering cry, before he had fallen silent.
Another scream to add to my collection…
Malagant tried to raise the wineskin up to his lips but his hands dropped it. The smell of infection were heavy on them now; he had given up on trying to save them. The earth medication had done a good job putting off the injuries festering, but even Ben’s stuff wasn’t good enough to stave off having your hands practically flayed and two fingers cut off.
The wineskin fell onto a slab of grey rock with a small clunk. Malagant reached down to pick it up, but he found himself clenching in pain.
Teal looked up. “No, don’t try,” he said. He rose to his feet and picked up the wineskin, then held it up for Malagant. “Open your mouth.”
His voice was so… cold.
And yet as Malagant looked at the expression on Teal’s face, he swore he had seen it before. Not on Teal though – Malagant couldn’t, for the life of him, remember where he had seen that face.
Malagant opened his mouth and Teal shot the wine from the wineskin into it. Malagant drank deeply and thanked him. With a nod Teal sat back down to continue sharpening the daggers.
Teal was hiding inside of himself. It was like what he’d done when he was in Ben’s world. Teal had left and a new elf had taken his place, one who could handle the situation he was in.
But… but I know I’ve seen those eyes before…
Malagant watched him and the distant, cold look that was Teal’s face now.
Scretch… scretch…
The sound of the whetstone against seeve was the only sound inside their camp. Teal’s eyes barely blinked, and when they did, the blinks were slow. That was because of the pill beans though. The ones Malagant knew he should take away from him. Malagant didn’t know enough about them to know how much was okay to take, but he knew his friend had crossed that threshold many times over.
Malagant wanted to help his friend, save his fragile little mind from the wolves destroying it, but he couldn’t… he couldn’t even save himself. All he could do was keep the kid company and try and stall his infection. The trip to Birch to have Anagin look at the prophecies had turned into a stop for survival. For Malagant’s hand, Teal’s head, and Ben’s life. No longer a trip to get Anagin to make sense of the prophecies, now Birch was the only thing that could save them.
They were still almost a week until Birch, if his calculations were correct. Which he didn’t know if they were. They were off the original course he had set for them and he wasn’t sure of the terrain.
A good hill could set them back hours now with Malagant’s hands. On the other side of it though, they were barely sleeping, and making better time. Malagant was also hoping that they might luck out and have missed out on the bigger hills of Lazarius altogether.
Time would tell.
When Malagant woke up the
next morning, Teal was still awake. He didn’t know if he slept, Malagant had stopped asking. This new Teal never seemed to sleep, and when Malagant had asked he just got a blank stare and a cold mumbled response.
They wordlessly packed up. Teal helped Malagant put his crossbow on, but that was about it. Teal slung his pack and put his swords into his scabbards and they were off. No hills in the distance thankfully, or villages either.
Arasbor was where he had originally wanted to stop, but it was too far west now. He knew of smaller villages in Lazarius and some magekeeps, but nothing that would have a qualified healer in it. No, Malagant had come to accept he would lose the rest of his fingers, if not his hands. No healer other than his father or an Evercovian blackmage could save him now. He would be lucky if he only lost his remaining fingers.
Teal walked beside him, his eyes had dark circles, as dark as Ben’s used to be. He still didn’t speak.
The prophecies didn’t say he was dead… Malagant had told him this when Teal had been mad with grief, but he hadn’t listened. The prophecies just said to stop looking, that could mean a number of things. We have to have hope, have faith… like you had told me. The gods wouldn’t end Ben’s story now.
But no, in Teal’s mind, Ben was gone. Their human had fallen. Teal’s mind had always been cruel to him, hell, Teal’s life had been cruel to him. It wasn’t folly not to assume the worst, because the worst always seemed to be the reality.
Malagant wanted to say something but his hands hurt too much, as did his back, his feet, his head…
The next day they spotted a small village, settled next to a large hill whose grey ridges were so tall they blocked out the evening sun. It was quaint and sleepy but, thankfully, it did have an inn in it. They walked into the village; it was too small to have anything more than half a wooden wall surrounding the north end from the Aryd winds. No one bothered them, but it probably was from fear of plague or sickness than impoliteness.
They walked down the packed dirt street towards the two-storey inn. The only multiple-storey building in the village besides a larger house that Malagant assumed housed the lord of the village. The houses were made of mud, brick, and stone, with thatched roofs. Trees were too sparse in this area to have many wooden houses. However the farther north they got the more trees were found; Birch especially, hence its name. Birch was surrounded by trees; all the houses there were wood or stone.