Chapter Forty-Three point Seven: Appeal to Animosity

  As consciousness crept back into Selriph’s awareness, the first thing that assaulted his senses wasn’t the stiff aches that crisscrossed in a lattice across his back—a result of flesh being torn asunder and impaled by the beetle’s legs.

  It was the soft, fresh alpine air in his nostrils mixed with the familiar scent of woodsmoke, carrying with it the meaty aroma of roasted game. A contrast to the acidic stench that had defined the last moments, he could immediately recollect.

  Selriph’s eyelids creaked open like the long-abandoned vault that had forced him into this debacle in the first place. His vision held two distinct sights, split almost mathematically down the middle; the rocky overhang of the cave filled one half, and the star-adorned night sky with Ralclune in its full phase in the other.

  Only then did his consciousness register the field of dull throbs across his back, pressed in by tightly wrapped bandages, the rough fabric clinging to his skin in a sterile embrace. The cold air was perfectly insulated by the cloak that had been draped over his person.

  Who…? Why have I already been tended to?

  As if cued by his internal query, two additional pieces of sensory information came into his purview. The first was the realisation that his body, in the stiff lethargy of being unconscious for what was likely hours, was not on its back. It was resting on a mild incline, the back of his head embraced by something soft—almost supple, comforting in texture, and wrapped in fabric, a stark contrast to the makeshift rolled-up linen he had grown accustomed to in the wilds.

  The second thing came into his vision, carrying the answer to the query of his somewhat unexpected position:

  For Raclune was suddenly eclipsed, not by another celestial body, but by the golden-haired visage of Kela, her shadowed expression bearing the signs of relief and expectancy—no doubt from the youth’s stir from his restful state.

  Selriph looked up, confused, his gaze tracking to the side, where empty vials lay, the minuscule drops of crimson the only evidence of what they contained—healing reagents.

  In the state of post-awakening fog, it took Selriph a few seconds to piece together the obvious: the elves had tended to him.

  His voice came with the cobwebs of rasp. “I… thank you.” As his fingers dug into the gravel at his side, he propped himself upwards, his vision tilting slightly as the blood rushed out of his head, and a faint pounding headache from his exertion came into his awareness.

  “It was nothing really; we should be thanking you,” her voice trailed off like the wisp of smoke, though her eyes were locked onto Selriph’s visage.

  The youth looked around as he struggled to comprehend his surroundings, his previous waking moments still a blur.

  In this centre, the campfire. Kaelan was to the right of his vision, tending to glass-like fragments—likely remnants of the arcane orb that once allowed him to manifest his elemental. To Selriph’s left, just behind the conjured facade—a makeshift windbreak of earthen magic — was Nightwind, in a deadpan stare at the darkened mountains and rocky gorge. Emmett sat next to her, paws under his body, faint cracks emanating from his churning jaw, as he bit into an unidentifiable piece of bone and flesh.

  Kaelan turned as he noticed the roused youth. “Ah, finally awake from your nap. We came back out; it’s safer to make camp here than in there,” he said, pointing with his thumb into the gloom of the cave. The entrance was blocked off with a series of loose rocks stacked into a crude wall, no doubt to discourage any curious residents from invading their camp.

  As the fog in Selriph’s mind cleared, Kaelan’s words catalysed the memories of his brief return to consciousness after his daring execution of the beetle: the burning sting of a healing potion on his skin, and the comforting feeling of being held by whatever figure had carried him out of the cave.

  Either that, or it was a conjured fabrication of his mind, trying to piece together the temporal lapse between his passing out and his current waking moment.

  “I see, apologies for having to drag my unconscious form out… must have been a trouble.”

  Kaelan’s eyebrows rose in surprise, and with a subtle gesture over the youth’s shoulder, a silent redirection of attribution to the one responsible.

  Selriph’s right brow furrowed as he turned back towards Kela. Her face held a strange countenance of expectancy of the gratitude sure to escape his lips, mixed with embarrassment, a slight flush on her face, accentuated by the dancing flames of the firelight.

  Selriph scratched his head, uncomfortable with the overt care shown by the elf. “You… you didn’t have to,” he said, his voice a strange mix of gratitude and awkwardness. “You could have just asked Emmett to drag me out.”

  A quip came from behind him: “The mutt would probably have just eaten you as his meal; he took a healthy chunk out of the buck before I could gather what was left.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me.” Selriph’s voice was dry as he caught Emmett’s ears twitch out of the corner of his vision.

  Selriph’s gaze traced beyond the fire, where a shield and staff lay against the wall, the latter’s bottom half scorched black–a result of the boy’s pyromancy.

  I’d better apologise for that later… But first.

  Selriph crawled over to his satchel, his parrying dagger, and his estoc. They sat neatly next to his bag—unopened.

  They used their supplies on me…

  Selriph’s eyes landed once more on Nightwind, the assortment of items that hung on her remained untouched, his sleeping supplies, along with the makeshift cushion wrapped in gut string. His eyes traced back to Kela, a statement bubbling to his lips as he gestured to the bedroll—no doubt Kela’s. “You could have left me on the ground; it would not have stunted my recovery.”

  Kela stared back, a frown forming on her brow. “Was it really that uncomfortable…?” she asked, a flicker of genuine pity in her eyes as she stared down at where Selriph’s head had rested mere moments ago.

  “Uncomfortable? What do you mean…?” Selriph’s visage was now plastered with bewilderment.

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  From behind him, Kaelan gave a heavy sigh, and Selriph felt a pat on his shoulder. He turned to find the elf staring at him, a silent judgment on his face—a cocktail of a frown, a budding laugh, and a weary disappointment.

  Of course, for all the keenness in Selriph’s mind that led him to the ingenious means of rendering death on the vault guardian, this was one expression he could not decipher.

  The trio sat around the campfire as the scent of venison filled the air, the clean pile of bones frequently graced by Emmett’s presence as the wolf seemed poised to continue snacking well past his first bite out in the tundra.

  “I am surprised at your display of guts. I thought when the beetle was set upon us, you’d just run off, leave us alone,” Kaelan stated, a mix of flat declaration and gratitude.

  Selriph replied, “Admittedly, the thought crossed my mind," as his thought briefly pivoted to an image of the pile of rubble—the collapsed section of the GreySpire old mines, his intended route east.

  Then he continued, his words bidding away the materialistic impetus for his daring feat. "But we had the means and method to dispose of it.” Selriph gestured at the shattered arcane orb and the twins’ respective casting catalysts.

  “I should... Apologies for the state of the focusing orb and the staff…” the human youth figited with his fingers as his voice trailed off.

  “What for? The vault will probably have a dozen such items." Kaelan’s inflected in rhetorical assurance.

  “If the rumours of Oagat’s work are true…” Kela’s voice was soft, a mix of unease that did not seem to stem entirely from the doubt in her words.

  In an unexpected concurrence with Kaelan, Selriph said, “Given the extensive warding on the door, something of value likely lies inside.”

  Kela’s voice came, the life returning to it as the retort formed, directed not at Selriph, but leveraging his statement at her brother: “If a certain itchy wand hand didn’t attempt to bust through the door, we wouldn’t have had to deal with the oversized bug in the first place.”

  Selriph’s voice came with a placating gesture. “It is fine, at least I can attempt to dispel the wards without fear of getting impaled by the jaws of that thing.”

  Kaelan’s brows perked up. “You make it sound like you could dispel an arcane lock by a senior mage.”

  Selriph’s memory flashed to the arcane buzz he felt moments before their kerfuffle with the beetle. It was complex, to be sure, but not by magnitudes in sophistication compared to the lockbox that old man Vick had tested on him in the ratways.

  The only difference seemed to be its scale, and the mechanisms attached to alerting the beetle—or more accurately, the cultivated specimen-cum-vault guardian.

  Selriph did not need to voice a statement to make his case, for it came from the female elf. “I believe he could.” Kela’s statement came with the same simple certainty she would use to describe the presence of snow on the mountainside.

  “A truly entertaining claim, sister! Next thing you are going to tell me is that he could single-handedly drive the bastards out of Ironcrag.” A chuckle escaped his lips as he bit into another healthy chunk of venison.

  Kela’s expression was serious, mirroring none of the dismissive levity of her brother as she looked into his crimson eyes; the silence was filled only by the crackling of the campfire.

  Kaelan’s eyes perked up. “You can’t be serious; even Valdor couldn’t do that at his age.”

  “But in four years, he might. The academies in Venthar could easily hone him. He could turn the tide when they come upon us again,” her voice welling with defensive enthusiasm, like a proctor in fervent defence of a plaintiff under holy accusation.

  The expectant statement of disagreement came not from Kaelan, but from the runaway templar—expressed through a single emphatic word.

  “No.”

  The twins, now seemingly re-attached by an invisible string tethering their gestures, turned towards Selriph. Their faces were plastered with confusion, like incoherent slum scribbles.

  “What do you mean, no?” Kaelan’s voice cracked as the incredulous notion of an answer washed through him.

  As if perfectly coordinated, Kela’s statement came next: “Exactly. If you hate the empire, why not come to Venthar?”

  “Don’t tell me that the Eldeitian hogwash has erased the fact that Venthar is the birthplace of the mages? You won’t get better mentors than—”

  “I said no. We had an agreement: I helped you into the vault to find this mithril golem; you help me clear the rubble you two caused.” Selriph’s voice was brimming with unexpected irritation.

  Kaelan’s bellow was stifled by the outstretched hand of his sister. Her brow was furrowed with irritation and confusion, but in her eyes, a soft light glowed with a sincere attempt to understand.

  “If you could indulge me–us. Why…?” her voice inflected in query, a tinge of pain in her question.

  Selriph’s statement came as a direct quote in the likeness of the woodsman he met at the River Valdorea. “South is held down tighter than a dragon’s hoard.”

  “We have ways to smuggle people across; the Eldeitian bastards aren’t all-seeing—especially not below ground,” Kaelan replied, his voice unusually diplomatically calm.

  “What, you mean an underground smuggling network, like a Shepherd’s Trail?” Selriph’s reply piqued with interest.

  “Yes, we have crossed the border at least five times in the past cycles, through underground tunnels warded against detection, supplies brought in from the motherland.”

  “Then such a network should exist east of the empire as well, towards the Naltherys state.” Selriph’s statement came firm, despite the unsubstantiated nature of its content.

  “Naltherys? Why in the aether’s name would you want to go there? Their magic academies don’t hold a candle to Venthar. Your talents would be—” Kaelan cut himself off, as if taken aback by the choice of words.

  “I couldn’t care less about the quality of the magic instruction, as long as I don’t have to think about Eldeitia,” Selriph dismissive irritation bleeding back into his voice.

  “Not to think of Eldeitia?!” Kaelan’s voice, now brimming once more with incredulous aggression, “With your skills with the blade and your magic, you could easily be a Ventharian Knight, just like…” His eyes traced to his shield, which lay inert on the rocky wall, and pain flickered in his irises

  The crunching of gravel came as Kela shuffled over to her brother, a hand extended on his shoulder in a gesture of comfort.

  Then she turned back to Selriph. “I don’t understand. You want to learn magic, but you hate Eldeitia. We want the same thing, to fight this cursed empire,” her voice laced with genuine curiosity.

  “That is where our priorities diverge. ” Selriph’s voice trailed off as the memory of the conversation at Hagan’s lodge flashed along with an image that hadn’t graced his mind’s eye since the day he left the templar compound.

  The mage tower—all but a myth in the dogmatic confines of Eldeitian platitudes, a symbol of magical study.

  A simple life of arcane study, buried in books, free of obligation, and without the shadow of animosity between states.

  His answer came, brimming with dreamy enthusiasm. “I just want a place to study magic in peace; that is all.”

  The twins did not mirror that same eagerness; they stared back as if they had heard the rambling of a madman.

  “You really have some nails loose,” as a huff escaped the male twin.

  Kela mumbled under her breath, the words nearly unintelligible, although somehow perfectly clear to Selriph.

  “Such a waste….”

  For the rest of the night, the three exchanged no words as each fell into their own contemplative silence. The only company that came to Selriph in his dreams—that same tower, now fully in view, with the sprawling walls and roofs of a mage college at its base, dotted with robed figures in the snow-covered grounds.

  Surrounded by the roaring peaks of the mountains.