Ari carefully tied half of a worm to his line, along with a jagged piece of flint that he hoped would make a serviceable hook. He cast the baited line out into the water and then sat down on the sand as he waited.
It took a while, long enough that he was beginning to have doubts, but he eventually got a bite. Ari almost dropped the line in surprise and had to quickly pull in both his enthusiasm and the catch. It was a decently sized fish, almost as long as his forearm, and he grinned as it flopped onto the sand.
The hook came loose during the struggle. Ari dove for the fish and wrapped his arms around it, but it thrashed loose.
“Damn!” he shouted.
The fish flopped again, nearing the edge of the water. A flash of light came from behind him, and Eva was suddenly soaring through the air. She landed with one foot on top of the fish, breaking its spine and rendering it helpless.
“My apologies,” she said, as she lifted their dinner and proffered it to him. “I should have asked your permission before shifting forms so casually.”
“No, that was the right thing to do, Eva,” said Ari. “Feel free to use your own judgement about this kind of thing in the future. It’s totally up to you.”
Eva frowned a little at his words but nodded.
“If that’s what you wish, Lord Stoneblood,” she said.
Ari chuckled. The mighty Lord Stoneblood. An orphan, a bastard, and the wielder of an ancient magical sword. Quite the combination indeed.
“We should head back and check on Kerys,” said Ari. “Do you want to hang out in the scabbard, or are you comfortable as you are?”
Eva shrugged. “It should be fine for me to maintain my incarnate form, as long as we make time to strengthen our bond tonight.”
Ari had been meaning to ask her just what “strengthening their bond” would entail. He considered how to phrase the question as they started through the forest, but something caught his eye before he could.
He froze in place, suddenly realizing that they weren’t alone.
CHAPTER 17
“Mud and blood,” Ari muttered. “What in Dormiar’s name is that?”
Ahead of them, a glowing blue sphere hovered in the air. It was about the size of an apple, and a thin wake of ethereal blue light trailed behind it, almost like the afterimage left from swinging a lit torch.
“It’s an entity known as a mesmer,” whispered Eva. “One of the more active remnants of the Saidican Empire.”
“A mesmer?” asked Ari. “Is it dangerous?”
“This one is not dangerous,” said Eva. “They vary in behavior, depending on their color. Light blue mesmers are unaware of their surroundings or circumstances. They are imprints of people who once lived, frozen in time.”
Ari shook his head. “What is that supposed to mean? And why is it that most of your explanations leave me with more questions than answers?”
Eva flashed a small smile.
“It is safe to approach it,” she said. “I believe doing so will provide you with a better understanding, in this instance.”
She set a reassuring hand on his shoulder, and Ari felt his cheeks flush a little as he noticed how close she was standing to him. Her silver-blue hair fell down across her neck and shoulders, framing her face and drawing his attention to the way her chest armor perfectly showcased her cleavage.
“Alright,” said Ari, clearing his throat. “Let’s see what happens.”
He walked toward the glowing sphere slowly, half wishing that he’d requested Eva to return to sword form first. The sphere took little notice of him, and nothing happened until he came within a few feet.
The sphere flashed with light, and a figure stood in its place. It was a man, his entire body blue, translucent, and ethereal. He had a similar build to Eva’s, tall and slender, and he towered over Ari by at least half a foot.
He held a bow with a notched arrow and was slowly making his way forward. He froze in place, and Ari took in a quick breath, wondering if maybe the man could see him after all.
The man said something in a language Ari didn’t understand and then pointed at something in the distance and dropped to one knee. He pulled the arrow back as far as it would go and then let it loose, the shaft sailing forward and disappearing after a few feet. Light flashed, and the man became a glowing sphere once more.
“He appears to be a Saidican trapper,” said Eva. “He seems as though he was in the middle of chasing a forest tiger and told his companion that he saw one ahead of them, hiding in the bushes.”
“Was he hunting it?” asked Ari.
“He was attempting to capture it for his master’s menagerie,” said Eva. “The Saidican Empire was prosperous and had little need for hunting animals for their meat.”
“Ah.” Ari stared at the mesmer for a few seconds. “Why is that what it showed me? And how did this man end up like this?”
Eva frowned a little and brought one hand to her forehead. She shook her head after a couple of seconds.
“It is a question that’s difficult for me to answer in my current state,” she said. “I know that the mesmers were once people, and that their existence is evidence of a great tragedy which was afflicted upon the Sai. I also know that they are imprints of significant memories, continuing to exist through their ability to absorb lingering essence. But there’s little else I can say with confidence.”
“How much of your memory have you lost?” asked Ari.
“I suspect I would need to have my memory back to answer that question,” said Eva with a slight smile.
Ari let out a small chuckle. “You aren’t as serious as you pretend to be, are you?”
Eva didn’t say anything, but she followed after him as he continued back toward where they’d left Kerys. The beach by the berry bushes was empty, but Kerys had drawn an arrow in the dirt pointing back in the direction of the tower.
“Do you remember anything about who you were before you, uh, became a sword?” asked Ari. He wasn’t sure if he’d phrased the question in the most tactful manner, but Eva didn’t seem to mind. She brushed a few strands of silver hair out of her face and shook her head.
“I do not,” she said. “I remember flashes of emotion. Smells. Tastes. But none of it is in coherent order, and it’s hard to separate the true memories from my own imaginings. My apologies, Lord Stoneblood.”
“You don’t have to apologize for that,” said Ari. “Just… if you start to remember, be sure to tell me. I’m curious.”
“I will, if I can.” Eva looked oddly sheepish, and she glanced away rather than meeting his gaze. The two of them made their way back up the hill to the tower, where they found Kerys in the process of carrying branches over for firewood.
“I caught a fish,” said Ari. “Think you can get the bones out of it?”
“Aristial,” said Kerys, in a whining voice.
“Fine,” he said. “I can probably figure it out. That means that you’ll have to handle the fire, though.”
“I’m already taking care of it,” she said.
“It might take a while,” said Ari. “You’re not starving, are you?”
“I’ve been sneaking berries all afternoon,” said Kerys. “I can wait.”
“Interested in helping out, Eva?” he asked. He looked over his shoulder and saw that Eva had meandered off over to the side of the tower. She brushed moss and vines back from a section of the wall and was staring at something underneath.
“What is it?” he asked as he came over.
Eva ran her hand across the wall, dispersing a layer of grime and revealing another ward underneath.
“I do not recognize this ward, but I suspect that it relates to the tower’s defenses,” said Eva. “There may be more nearby like it.”
They found six wards in total inscribed into the tower’s outer wall, all of them identical. Ari wondered if there might be even more of them, higher up the wall, but they didn’t have the means to climb up and clear the vines off, just yet.
“Y
ou said they relate to the tower’s defenses,” said Ari. “Could that be something we could take advantage of? Would it be possible to activate the wards and use them to defend against the fishers?”
“It is possible, I believe,” said Eva. “Likely, even. We should perform a more in-depth survey of the tower’s interior to see if there is anything else of note waiting for us.”
Ari carried the fish inside and set it down on top of the common room’s table. He and Eva headed up the spiral staircase, pausing only briefly on the second floor to confirm that there weren’t any interior wards there before continuing on.
The third floor was a single large room with several items of immediate interest. Bookshelves covered most of the walls, and most of them were packed to the brim with old volumes, though a significant number were obviously soiled and decrepit with age.
A circular stone table sat in the center of room with a number of wards on it that looked more intricate and flashier than the others Ari had seen. He approached it slowly, looking over at Eva as he began to run his hand across the table’s surface.
“This is an enchanting altar,” she said. “Lord Stoneblood, it cannot be understated how significant of a find this is.”
“An enchanting altar?” asked Ari. “Interesting. What could we do with this?”
“The most relevant purpose, given your circumstances, is to disenchant objects for the sake of recycling and storing their magical essence.”
“Could we use that essence to create enchanted objects of our own?” asked Ari. He felt a little excited at the prospect and wondered what he might be able to accomplish with Eva’s help and a little creativity.
“Theoretically, yes,” said Eva. “However, doing so would also require you to either have a form of mystica or another enchanted item. The pattern of an enchantment must come from somewhere. The enchanting altar must be primed with a pattern to overlay the essence it contains onto another object and create the actual enchantment.”
“Interesting,” said Ari.
“What I would recommend is for you to use the altar to collect the essence from enchanted objects for other purposes,” said Eva. “Such as activating the wards that the tower already contains. The altar gives us a secondary means for collecting the required essence.”
“Secondary means?” asked Ari. “What’s the first?”
In answer, Eva turned around and pulled the bottom hem of her armored shirt up, revealing her lower back. Ari stared, dumbfounded, at what looked like a small tattoo just above her butt. He wasn’t sure what to say for a couple of reasons, not all of which were appropriate to voice aloud.
“As a sword construct, I have the ability to equip runestones meant for usage in enchanted weapons,” said Eva. “They are similar in function to wards but usually with a small, combat focused effect.”
Ari hesitated and then reached his hand out.
“Can I touch it?” he asked.
“Of course,” said Eva. “It is a runestone of magical absorption and nullification. Through it, I can not only counter most magical attacks but also absorb small amounts of essence from them.”
Ari touched a finger to Eva’s runestone. It felt exactly like a tattoo, and he noticed a small shiver run through her as he made contact.
“How can this help us?” asked Ari. “Are you saying that if I attack creatures with you in sword form, you can absorb their essence?”
“Only with certain kinds of entities,” said Eva. “The level of absorption is miniscule. Most intelligent races won’t have enough essence for the absorption to be noticeable.”
“What about fishers, and other weather monsters?”
Eva shook her head. “They are… different. Unthinking. Born from a curse, or dark magic.”
“Then how is this relevant?” he asked.
“The mesmer are made of almost pure essence,” said Eva. “The blue ones common on the surface are too weak to provide much, but I may be able to lead you to a place where they are stronger. You could harvest them to collect the essence you would need to activate the wards.”
Ari raised an eyebrow at her. “Are you familiar with this area?”
“Unfortunately not,” said Eva. “But I am familiar with the continent as a whole. The Saidican Empire was rather densely populated. You can see for yourself.”
She took his hand and led him up to the next floor. The tower’s fourth floor, as far as Ari could tell, was either unused or unfinished. It was an empty room with no partitions, and it reminded him of the freshly dug caverns in Golias Hollow before anything had been done with them.
The spiral stairs continued up, however, and he followed Eva through the hatch that led to the roof. It was overgrown with moss and vines, but Ari noted the ceramic vegetable planters arrayed in rows. She brought him to the edge of the waist-high stone walls encircling the tower’s exposed top level.
“There,” said Eva. “Can you see those ruins on the edge of the horizon?”
The sun was in the midst of setting, and Ari had to draw his attention away from the fascinating mixture of colors to see what she was talking about.
“That’s an old Saidican Empire city,” he said. “Isn’t it?”
“A small city, but yes,” said Eva. “I do not recognize it, so I cannot tell you its name. But everything you seek can be found there. Mesmers, and possibly also enchanted items that might be scavenged.”
Ari nodded slowly. “Okay. Collecting magical artifacts and fighting mesmers for their essence. That sounds like a plan of action.”
“A wise plan, at that,” said Eva. “But for it to be effective, you must first strengthen our bond.”
“You keep mentioning that,” said Ari. “How exactly do we go about it, though? If our bond is part of what determines your strength, I want it to be as strong as possible.”
A small smile played across Eva’s lips, and Ari felt a sudden, odd tension in the air.
“Perhaps it would be best if we spoke more on that after dinner,” she said.
CHAPTER 18
The two of them headed back down to the first-floor common room. At Eva’s suggestion, and after almost stabbing his own palm, Ari left the duty of skinning and deboning the fish to her and instead took on another task.
He’d set his sleeping pad out to dry when they’d arrived at the tower the previous night, along with the leather covering of the kellowack. The sleeping pad already had four dividing segments sewn into it to help the silk scraps it was stuffed with bunch up more evenly. Ari merely had to tear along the dividers to convert it from a single sleeping pad into five much needed pillows.
He performed a similar procedure with the kellowack covering once Eva was done with the knife, making four medium sized blankets out of it. They wouldn’t exactly be comfortable, given the roughness of their base material, but they’d certainly be warm.
He brought his creations up to the second floor, setting up a room for himself, Kerys, and Eva. By the time he made it back downstairs, the smell of cooking fish was thick on the air.
Ari found Eva and Kerys sitting around the campfire outside, conversing with each other. They seemed to be getting along rather well, which was a relief after the suspicion she’d expressed about Eva earlier that morning.
“It was nice enough,” said Kerys. “It was all we knew, really. We were part of a community down there. I miss it quite a lot. My mom and dad. My brothers.”
“You say that there was no contact with the surface?” asked Eva. “No trade or communication?”
“None,” said Kerys. “At least, aside from the Choosing ceremony which happened once each year. The people who left during that never came back.”
“Forgive me for saying this, milady,” said Eva. “But if that truly was the case, then you should look on your current circumstances as a blessing. You’ve been given true freedom.”
“True freedom?” Kerys stared at Eva in abject disbelief. “We barely have enough food tonight for all of us to sate our hunger,
and we might all die if it rains, and you call that true freedom?”
“She has a point,” said Ari. “We’re free to do anything we want. Including run from terrifying monsters while screaming for our lives.”
“You aren’t funny, Aristial,” said Kerys.
“I meant no offense,” said Eva. “My point was simply that your previous home sounds as though it had its own set of drawbacks and limitations.”
“I guess that’s true,” said Kerys. “Though if I’d had a choice, I would have stayed with my family.”
She carefully shifted the hot rock she’d been cooking the fish on out of the fire. Ari came around with his knife and started to cut it into three portions when a thought hit him.
“Do you have to eat, Eva?” he asked.
She opened her mouth, and then gave a small, hesitant shrug. “No. Not if I’m in my sword form. I can go for long periods of time without food.”
“That implies that you do need to eat if you’re going to stay in your body for tonight,” said Ari.
“That’s true,” she said. “I should shift out of my incarnate form to allow the two of you to take a larger portion.”
“No,” said Kerys. “That’s okay. Between the fish and the berries, we should have enough for all of us.”
“What does it feel like?” asked Ari. “Being in your sword form?”
“That is… difficult for me to describe,” said Eva. “I can sleep and allow myself to become dormant if I choose to. When you’re wielding me actively, I can sense the world through your eyes. It is a rather limited existence, but still serene in its own right.”
“A rather limited existence,” said Kerys. “Like life in the Hollow.”
Ari cut the fish into three sections, passing the two larger portions to Kerys and Eva. The meat was tender and full of flavor, and he tamped down his stomach’s demands for more once he’d finished by eating several large handfuls of Kerys’ berries.
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