Volume 1, Chapter 46: A Little Light Conversation (Patreon)

The suspicious eyes of my two traveling companions hadn’t stopped glancing my way for the last several hours of the journey.

Eventually, though, after pushing our way up a mushroom-covered hill, we finally emerged onto its broad, flat summit. From there, we could see the surrounding land sinking into darkness, illuminated only by the faint glow of the flora growing across it.

“We’ll stop here. The animals need to rest,” Hurrin ordered just as I released Cinderhide, letting fragments of volcanic dust and sparks drift away on the breeze.

His gaze followed the particles. His face twisted with distaste, but he didn’t comment. He simply dismounted.

“Man, finally. My ass hurt like a motherfucker,” Peter said. “Crazy thing is, there was a time I woulda gave damn near anything just to be able to say that shit. Now I’m already sick of it.” He jumped down from his mount and landed on his feet.

“You were in a wheelchair?” I asked, putting the pieces together.

“Ten years. Shit, more than ten. Damn near eleven. Diving accident. Man, fuck that—wasn’t no accident. I was bein’ stupid. Ain’t check how deep that shit was, just jumped in like some dumb-ass kid. Lucky it only fucked me up from the waist down, you feel me? Then my beautiful-ass aliens came through and gave me the power to beat that shit.” He sounded strangely excited, almost as though he had been waiting for a chance to tell someone about it.

“You control blood? You can heal yourself—is that what fixed your spine?”

“Blood? Nah, man.” He stepped closer to me.

Hurrin, meanwhile, merely listened as he pulled stakes and a hammer from his luggage.

“Water! My Path’s the Water Wrangler! I always loved water, always loved swimmin’, even after that shit took my legs—’cause like I told you, that was my own fuckin’ fault. Hell, I even taught myself how to swim without usin’ my legs.”

“So magically speaking, I guess you’re pretty much my opposite. I use fire.”

“What, you used to like runnin’ your ass into burnin’ buildings or some shit?” He laughed.

“Not really. It’s actually a pretty fucking short story. My parents died in a fire when I was a kid, and right before I got abducted, I made myself a makeshift flamethrower… Apparently the Daimon decided that was enough. None of the other Paths it offered me seemed magical enough.”

“My man!” He shouted it and raised a hand.

I decided to go along with it and gave him a high five. We held it there for a second before letting go.

“Dude, I ain’t think it worked like that either, but I guess the human body mostly water and shit. So one of my abilities lets me heal myself—least back to whatever the hell my body—fuck, scratch that shit—my soul thinks is normal.”

“So for those eleven years, you believed you’d eventually get the use of your legs back?”

“Damn fuckin’ right. I don’t quit for shit.” He smiled as he took off his sunglasses, revealing the scar across his face again.

I pointed at it.

“What about that?”

“Figured I’d leave that shit just like it is. Looks fuckin’ fire. No offense.”

“I have to admit, you’re a little different from the guy I thought you were at first. You surprised me,” I replied, watching Hurrin out of the corner of my eye as he hammered stakes into a patch of worked ground.

This couldn’t have been his first time stopping here, which made me feel a little better. At least it gave me hope that he actually knew where we were going.

“What, you thought I was some kinda bitch or somethin’? Thought ’cause I lost to that ugly-ass motherfucker, that meant I was weak? That I gave up on the mine exploration? Hell nah. Everything got its time. Life taught me not givin’ up ain’t the same as keepin’ your head down and runnin’ into the same damn wall forever. Sometimes you gotta take the long way ’round if you really tryna get where you goin’. Ain’t that right, Mr. Guide?” he called toward Hurrin, chuckling under his breath.

The other man muttered something as he drove the stake the rest of the way into the ground, then turned and approached us.

“It would be wise not to raise your voices. We are high up, and sound carries. Unless we want more uninvited guests—”

“Yeah, yeah, man, I got you,” Peter interrupted him, lowering his voice. “I’ma be quiet as a fuckin’ mouse.”

He chuckled to himself again while the messenger headed back toward the stakes.

“Yo, but for real, what’s up with that skin? You actually finna wear that nasty-ass shit? Man, I wouldn’t touch it even if it was drippin’ magic. That is a magic item, right?” Apparently, the guy liked to talk, because despite the barrage of questions, he barely left me enough room to answer any of them. “And what’s up with that staff you carryin’? That some kinda artifact too?”

“Whew. First, I try not to leave behind anything that might prove useful, which is why I took it. And yes, it’s a magical item, although I don’t intend to use it. Maybe I’ll sell it to someone in the city. Second, the staff is just a torch mounted on top of a metal pole.”

“You’re not worried those ropes holding the whole thing together are gonna burn through?”

“Not yet. But I’m planning to make something more permanent out of it eventually.”

“I ain’t no help in that case. My magic lets me make water hold whatever shape it’s in without, shit, how I’m supposed to say this—without freezin’ it. You feel me? At first I could straight-up freeze the shit, but I fuckin’ hate the cold. So when I got the chance to upgrade that ability, I took it the other way—keep the shape, don’t fuck with the temperature. Now I got four abilities. Regeneration, but that shit drains the hell outta me. Movin’ water around with my Soma. Freezin’ it. Or lockin’ that shit into whatever shape I want.” He flexed his arms, which were genuinely massive. “Man, this shit fuckin’ awesome. I feel like a goddamn superhero.”

“I can control fire too, increase its power, surround my body with fiery armor, and generate fire out of thin air,” I lied, trying to build myself up a little in his eyes. “I like that shape-retention ability of yours. Tell me more about it.” I watched Hurrin lead his mount toward one of the stakes by its tether.

“What you tryna know?”

“Can you shape something, say a ball of water, and throw it? Or does it have to stay in contact with your body?” I asked while Hurrin began tying the animal down, apparently to make sure it didn’t wander off.

“Nah. Right now I gotta touch the shit. But who knows? Maybe soon I’ma be out here throwin’ ice balls and blood spears and all kinda crazy shit. I heard you threw some big-ass fire spear at them orcs when y’all was fightin’ over that chunk of rock and skeleton, right?”

I nodded in response, and his eyes suddenly widened as he nudged me with his elbow.

“Man, imagine if some necromancer got control of that big-ass toad that was tryna eat the temple. Oh, fuck. That shit would be epic.”

“That doesn’t exactly bode well for the people settling there. Why are you going to the city? Do you have a quest there?” I asked, not wanting to suggest what mine was.

“Yeah, but I can’t really be out here talkin’ ’bout it in present company,” he said, covering part of his face with one hand. “Got somethin’ to do with the vizier’s treasury, you feel me?”

“Never mind. I didn’t ask, and I don’t know anything.”

“Bet. So how much Essence you sittin’ on now? Gotta be a lot, right? I keep seein’ you pop that spell every damn minute.”

“Apparently, it isn’t the most efficient way to accumulate Essence. When I use it like this, the gains are minimal. The soul somehow recognizes when we’re using magic in a way that, how do I put it, isn’t particularly inspiring?” That matched what I had discovered myself. I wasn’t training Cinderhide to accumulate Essence, and apparently my soul treated it accordingly. What I wanted was to improve the endurance of my Psyche, so roughly every fifteen minutes I activated the armor on my hand for a short while and then shut it off again.

That was how I discovered my Psyche had enough time to fully recover between uses.

“Right now I’ve got 435 Essence,” I lied, adding exactly a hundred to the real number.

“Damn, that ain’t bad. That your max or what? Nah, wait—how much that upgrade cost you?”

“Two hundred thirty,” I invented. “What about you?”

“I cap out at 331, and mine cost 280. That shit popped up as an option when I was fightin’ between these hot-ass geysers and my ice knuckles and claws was meltin’ way too fuckin’ fast. Gave me a couple choices—stuff like controllin’ water so I could freeze it at higher temperatures and under more pressure, or just straight-up shapin’ the water itself.” He moved closer to his reptodon and handed the reins to Hurrin, who took them from him. “This whole magic system is fuckin’ sick.”

“Maybe. It would be better if it didn’t come with the possibility of death and the destruction of entire human civilizations, but generally speaking, yeah. It’s okay.”

After answering, I grabbed the reins of my reptodon and started leading it toward the stakes Hurrin had driven into the ground, where the man was currently tying up Peter’s mount.

The Water Wrangler followed me.

“Man, you really one of them glass-half-empty dudes, huh? Don’t worry.” He slapped me on the back hard enough that I knew I’d have a bruise later. “We gon’ kick the shit outta every alien tryna step up to us. Don’t matter what kinda gauntlets they got, don’t matter if they come out strong or weak. Soon as we run into ’em, I’ma show ’em what it mean to be the fuckin’ master of water!” He threw one arm into the air in triumph. “I like you, Arthur. You a little weird, but overall, I think you a cool-ass dude, you know?”

“Be silent,” Hurrin reminded him.

“I’ve been called worse.” I replied to Peter and then turned toward our guide.

“What’s the plan, Master Hurrin? We taking turns on watch?”

“I got first,” Peter said.

“No. You gentlemen may sleep as much as you wish. I intend to remain awake the entire time,” Hurrin replied, pulling out something that looked like an hourglass with extra steps. Several narrow tubes connected its upper section, and the whole mechanism appeared to turn itself over once the sand finished falling to the bottom. “Seven turns, and we leave.” He set it up near the lizards.

“Bet. I’m finna get somethin’ to eat,” Peter replied.

I reached for the staff containing Bri, took it out, and gently leaned it against the saddle. Then I pulled my stringpen and one of my sketchbooks from my backpack—the one in which I had painted our escape from the sandstorm. I decided to use the planned free time to do something completely unproductive and paint for a while.

With everything in hand, I walked several dozen paces toward the opposite cliff.

At some point, deprived of the light from my portable lantern, Hurrin pulled out some kind of bioluminescent sphere and placed it beside himself.

I found a little spot between the rocks overlooking the dark valleys below us. I wedged my staff firmly between two stones, laid the sketchbook on another rock, and, turning away from Bri, finally took the piss I had been holding in for far too long.

“It’s, um, really weird that you willingly get rid of water from your bodies. And I, well, know why it happens. I know how your body works, but, um… it’s still really weird.”

“Hey, Bri,” I replied. “I missed your voice.”

“Really?” she asked, flaring brighter.

“Of course. Honestly, ever since we reached Plasario’s camp, we haven’t had much time for any heart-to-heart talks. There were always too many people around.”

“Or, um… you kept going off somewhere by yourself. You like doing things alone, don’t you?”

She asked just as I pulled my pants back up and returned for my sketchbook and painting tool.

“Sometimes.” I played with the stringpen for a moment purely for the pleasure of listening to its sounds, then settled on a graphite color and began laying down the first lines on the paper. “But there are times, when I prefer to have a company.”

“Do you ever think about, well, Mara and Elias?”

“Elias? That was Eli’s name?” I asked, drawing first few circles, using the Loomis method.

She grimaced at my response, and a larger flame burst from her hair.

“Yeah. Well, yes. Do you ever think about them? I do. When I close my eyes and everything goes black, um, then I see Mara’s face, asking me to check what’s happening around us, and when I look back at her again, there’s no life left in her. Or Eli, all twisted up while that horrible toad was eating him… It makes me sad. It’s hard when thoughts about them come back.”

“I’m sorry, Bri. Honestly, I don’t think about them.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” I shrugged. “I didn’t get attached to them. Life taught me pretty quickly that people die, or they leave, and sooner or later I end up alone.”

“Does that, well, mean you wouldn’t be sad if, you know, Khufu died? Or Sophie? Or Nicky?”

“I don’t think so. Maybe for a little while.”

“What about me? Would you be sad? Would you, um, cry if I died?”

“Yes, Bri.” I looked at her and told her what she wanted to hear. “I’d never forgive myself if you died while under my protection.”

“But that, well, sounds a little like I’m something that belongs to you. Like you’d suffer because I’m not there anymore, not because I’m gone as, um, me. Is that how it is?”

“No, Bri.” The answer came before I'd properly considered her words. What bothered me was that she might actually be right. “I like you. I like them too. Even Nicky, who probably doesn’t like me much anymore, assuming she ever did. The fact is, I’ve gotten used to people coming and going.” I paused. “Being alone is bearable.”

“You don’t have to be, um, alone anymore, you know? I can always stay with you.”

“Thank you, Bri,” I replied, sinking back into my thoughts and looking at the general shape of the face I had started with. Hers was the first. The wildest and most untamed. Hidden inside an eternally hungry fire that, left uncontrolled, could consume practically everything, was the face of a little girl curious about the world and wanting nothing more than to help. Once the basic lines were done, I lifted the sketchbook and showed it to her. “Happy? I started with you.”

“Wow, that’s, um, really beautiful. I didn’t know you could paint faces.”

“I can paint practically anything. Truth be told, I used to paint mostly faces and hands, so you could say those are what I have the most practice with. I’m planning to paint all our friends, but first you and your colors, Bri. You first.” I repeated the last words quietly to myself while playing high notes on the stringpen, bringing out oranges, reds, and yellows, and began laying color onto the paper.

Lost in the process, it took me a moment to notice the strange, non-light of Soma gathering around my hand and leaving a rainbow glow behind every movement. I lifted the stringpen for a moment and watched it follow my hand. Then, when I touched the tool to the paper again, the glow began sinking into it.

“I feel kind of, um, weird right now, you know?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, continuing to watch both what I was painting so I could guide my hand and the magic of light and color accompanying it.

“Sometimes when I try to calm myself down and turn off my hearing, if magic happens nearby, I start experiencing it in these really strange ways. Like, when you use fire, I feel warmth. I hear scratching and sizzling. And there’s this sense of balance, like I’d have to—if I had feet—walk across a tightrope without falling.

“It’s weird, but I know that’s what it feels like. And recently my Daimon started telling me that, um, it’s magic coming from the Domain of Magma Arts when you use Pyrography or Cinderhide, or the Domain of Conflagration when you use Stoke.

“I felt similar things around Khufu, Nicky, and Sophie, but back then my Daimon still couldn’t, um, give their magic a specific name. It tried once with Sophie. When I turned off my hearing, I smelled freshness and soil, and felt this tickling and buzzing of insects, well… mhm. It tried to classify it then, but all I got was: [Foreign domain’s magic detected within Aura, unable to determine the type.]”

“My Daimon has never suggested anything like that to me, but I sometimes get strange sensory impressions too. Especially recently, when that necromancer and her skeletons appeared. Do you think that’s how Aura works? It lets us perceive magic?”

“Maybe, um. But that’s not what I wanted to tell you. I wanted to, well, let you know that right now, while you’re drawing, my Daimon is giving me, um, the exact same message: [Foreign domain’s magic detected within Aura, unable to determine the type.]”