Chapter 92: Plume

  RAVHEN

  The question of intelligence had been answered quickly enough. As if the satchel and signs of tool use hadn’t been enough, the bird’s initial mimicry had very rapidly turned into using a word or two in a voice that wasn’t that of one of the elves. He was clearly a fast learner, and the way it looked at them so intensely spoke to how much it wanted to communicate.

  Achen had identified him as a male, and while the creature definitely knew the concept of a name, none of the elves had been able to easily replicate the trilling chirp that he seemed to call himself. Achen, who was best with it, had come the closest, but eventually everyone settled on calling him ‘Plume’ for now. After some back and forth, the bird accepted the name, which gave enough common ground to pantomime directions.

  “The satchel didn’t have much.” Veysen had sorted through the bird’s few belongings while Plume was washing off the blood and gore in the stream. “A few berries and roots, some crudely-shaped rocks that I think are tools. It’s also just uncured hide. He’s pretty primitive.”

  Ravhen leaned back against a tree and scratched at his chin. The small group had cleared some of the undergrowth away to make a little campsite, cramped but serviceable, next to the stream. Not far away, Plume was shaking himself and letting feathers drip dry… at least for a few moments. Ravhen caught a brief tickle of Flux mana from his Mana Sense, and Plume was abruptly dry, a shower of water spattering around the bird.

  As interesting as that was, Ravhen wasn’t sure if it was a conscious use of magic or just some ingrained ability. He turned to Fisska. “Have you rested enough to try the translation spell? Do you think it will work?”

  Fisska flicked his tail in a way that showed mild uncertainty, but he didn’t stop laying out the focal stones. It was a relatively new technique in some ways – something practiced for thousands of years, but only recently formalized – but the stones would let him form more complex patterns, and hold them longer than simple incantations would allow. Ravhen hadn’t realized that Fisska possessed a focal version of this spell, but he was glad for it now.

  “I can handle this, I’m good at mana conversion and it’s a high mana area.” Fisska adjusted one more gleaming gemstone and stepped back, examining the pattern. “It might be a little odd, because he’s not anything like an elf, but it should work. He clearly has an idea of ‘self’ and understands concepts. He figured out the waterskin right away and seemed interested in it. It might sound like talking to a child, though.”

  Ravhen dipped ears in acknowledgement and crossed his arms. “I guess it’s worth a try anyway.” The spell was designed for translating between elf dialects, though Ravhen knew dragons had a version of it to speak to the elves as well. He also knew that highly-refined spells could specialize over the centuries to the point where they were less flexible than earlier versions. Usually, the increased mana efficiency was worth the tradeoff, but no one in this group had the raw talent to develop a new spell on the fly. If this didn’t work, they’d have to rely on pantomime.

  “Plume!” Achen called out to the bird, beckoning him toward the circle. She pointed to him, then to the circle, before tilting her head and waiting to see if he got the idea. It seemed pretty clear to Ravhen, but who knows how this strange beast thought?

  When directed, the now-cleaned and healed bird walked over toward the circle. Ravhen observed that the walk was careful and precise, almost elegant, but he had yet to see Plume try to fly. It was clear those wings weren’t meant for handling things, even with the thumblike claws at the top. He’d seen Plume handle the satchel, but fine manipulation was at the feet, not the wings.

  Plume stopped at the edge of the circle and leaned forward. The bird creature flexed a foot, and Ravhen recognized the gesture. Plume hadn’t just noticed, but the gleaming stones were tempting to him. He wanted to snatch one up, and suddenly the flaw in this plan was obvious. Fisska had warned he was like a child, of course he’d be interested in something shiny.

  Surprising everyone, Plume decided not to grab the stone and stepped forward again, standing in the circle. His feathers rustled and his tail fanned out, giving the distinct impression of fidgeting, but he chirped one of the words he’d learned: “What?”

  “He sure is learning words quickly,” Ravhen muttered. It hadn’t been very long, but the bird already knew two or three hands of words, not counting the five names he’d memorized. Ravhen wasn’t sure if that was fast or not.

  This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

  A wave of mana pressure pulsed out from the circle, telling everyone that the spell had been cast. Plume stiffened, head darting about to look for enemies, but Fisska interrupted him with a question.

  “Can you understand me now?”

  The bird’s head snapped toward the caster, and Ravhen tensed as well. He needn’t have worried. After the initial confusion, Plume chirped, and everyone understood him.

  “Yes! Plume understands! He thank/grateful gestures!”

  Ravhen let out a breath. The translation wasn’t perfect, but it was enough. This time, he was the one who spoke. “We have never seen anyone like you. Are there more of you? And how did you get so badly hurt?”

  The series of chirps, squawks, and twitters that followed was harder to understand, as if straining the limits of the spell, but it held together.

  “Plume never find/see/grab you. Plume from home/nest/gathering. Is home/nest/gathering [Horizon Bearer] find places. Find new nests for rooken.” He tucked his head toward the tower, out of sight but easy to guess the direction it lay in. “Tall rock with cave inside. Feeling/System/Menu talk danger. Plume run and monster follow.”

  The bird-creature gestured around. “Talk strange. Ravhen child/chick?”

  Veysen chuckled and Achen turned her head aside so she couldn’t be seen stifling a laugh. Even Fisska’s ear twitched in amusement, but he maintained the spell, and answered for everyone.

  “The magic we use to understand one another does not work perfectly. I think we are both speaking like adults but it has to simplify because we are so different.”

  This answer just confused Plume, though. He stared at the group, one after another, and then chirped in elvish, “Magic?” A pause, and he continued in his own language, “Plume does not know this.”

  Ravhen gestured for the others to be silent as he took over again. “It is hard to explain. It is one way to change the world around us, if you can understand that. But you say you tried to go inside the tower and were attacked?” He stopped and used a toe claw to sketch a rough outline on the ground, in the shape of a tower. “This place?”

  Plume chirped a quick reply. “Yes. Plume felt badness/danger/need. Must fight tall rock. Feeling/System/Menu speak.”

  The others looked again at Ravhen, but he was already pondering this. He hadn’t missed the class mentioned in the dialogue… this creature had a similar class to him, one that was a fairly famous one. Plume also kept trying to say something about the System but it wasn’t very clear. Obviously they had the System in common, but something was breaking down when they tried to talk about it.

  He turned to the others. “I think it might be something like a Quest. We should take a look at the tower, but be careful. Plume, we’re going to look at the tower, but only just inside. Then we’ll take you home if you want. Do you need help or can you fly home?”

  The light squawking whistle sounded morose. “Plume not fly. Many days.”

  That was what Rahven had expected. The wounds would have been fatal if they hadn’t found the bird… or ‘rooken’ as he seemed to call his people. Magical healing from a talented healer like Fisska could do quite a lot, but at some point the body had to take over the healing process.

  “We shouldn’t stay in one place for too long.” Veysen spoke up abruptly, grasping his spear. “This is a high mana area, the monsters are bound to sniff us out. I doubt that thing Plume killed is the worst one.”

  “Plume know safe ways!” The rooken hopped on his uninjured foot, looking eager now. As eager as a bird could look, anyway. “Plume guide!”

  Achen glanced at Ravhen for confirmation, but seemed to agree with the bird. “He probably knows the area better than we do. Also, if he’s a [Horizon Bearer] he might have tricks to help. It sounds like the monster came from the tower.”

  Ravhen still hesitated, but it was a sound argument. “What level are you, Plume? And did you have a weapon? We could try to replace it if you need a… spear or something.” He wasn’t sure how the rooken would use a spear, though. Would he stand on one foot and thrust with the other? The wings looked too clumsy for it.

  A sad whistle rose from the bird. “Plume not understand ‘level’?” The word was spoken in the elven tongue, and Ravhen mentally kicked himself. The rooken was a quick study, but still very primitive. He probably couldn’t grasp the numbers needed. It was unlikely he even saw the Status in the same way, if he didn’t know how to read.

  The bird flapped his wings once. “Plume fight with rock. Fly. Drop rock. Can’t fight now.” Another sad trill. “Good fight until close. Plume bad when close.”

  A ranged fighter then. It made sense… the rooken looked pretty fragile, and Ravhen was sharp enough to realize a rock dropped from high up would be pretty lethal against most things. Without the ability to get airborne, though, the bird creature would be almost helpless. The monster he took down was almost certainly a lucky and desperate strike, not a coordinated attack.

  Nothing to be done for that now, he knew. Ravhen looked around at the group. “We can’t afford to actually go far into the tower, but we should look at it. Then we can take Plume home and meet his… nest or whatever. Any objections?”

  It wasn’t their specific task. The four elves were meant to be explorers, not to rescue the locals. But the chance to meet an entire population could be far more useful to learning about the surrounding area than just walking, and all of them knew it. None raised a concern.

  “Good.” Ravhen picked up Plume’s satchel and passed it over to the rooken, who wriggled into it and patted it flat. Very little was left of the original contents, mostly the tools.

  Ravhen pointed toward the tower, or the direction he thought it was. “We won’t be able to talk like this after you step out of the circle, but I think we can figure out enough to get by. Lead the way.”

  Not a Quest