Rivers were a nuisance during campaigns. Nathan considered himself extremely fortunate that the Federation hadn’t defended the Forselle River.
“There’s a lot of them,” Anna said. “Couldn’t they attack and send us running back to the Empire?”
“Numbers don’t mean much in a battle between Bastions,” Seraph said.
“That’s right. Theus needs to deal with us himself. If we’re forced to attack, he’ll have a greater advantage the closer we are to his binding stone,” Narime added.
They stood around a table in the command tent. Nathan had already made his plans, and therefore had little to contribute. Anna, Seraph, and Narime discussed the current situation while he read a book in the corner. A wisp buzzed about in a glass globe next to him.
“You’re certain that Theus controls the binding stone?” Anna asked.
“No. Torneus has other Bastions,” Narime admitted. “But Theus is his puppet. And even those who are loyal to him, like my former Bastion, might not be trustworthy right now.”
“But Theus is an idiot, by all accounts,” Anna said. “What makes him worth investing in?”
“He’s a powerful idiot,” Narime said. “He has three duogem Champions. That alone makes him one of the most influential Bastions in the Federation. The only other Bastion loyal to Torneus with as many Champions was Arriet, and he has one less now.”
Anna frowned, then looked over to Nathan. Ignoring her, he reached over and picked up a glass from the table. It held cheap brandy that the soldiers had brought with them. Nasty stuff, but it helped distract him.
“You say that, but doesn’t Nathan have two duogems now. And I know he plans to promote Fei, at the very least,” Anna said. “Plus, Sen’s fairly powerful.”
“There’ll be some possessed in the defenders,” Narime said. “Although I doubt any of them will be as powerful as Sen. She’s something else. Normally, people become possessed because they lack talent or power. The spirit grants them both, and they can overwhelm sorcerers with decades of experience. But monogem Champions are normally more than a match for them.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“The answer is that Nathan is exceptional. Although he also has a lot of binding stones now,” Seraph said. “Most Bastions rely on fewer binding stones for their Champions. Theus had two, and he maintained four duogems and a monogem at his peak.” She was referring to the time when she and Sunstorm served Theus.
“So, Nathan could have far more?” Anna’s eyes widened. “Why doesn’t he?”
“Trust, I imagine,” Narime said, nodding her head.
Anna looked between the two duogem Champions in front of her. “Um, it’s rather surreal to hear that being said when both of you defected from the Federation.”
Narime’s face turned red. “I’m doing the right thing. Nathan is the first Bastion I’ve met who is actively working for something greater.”
“He knows more than any other Bastion I’ve even heard of. The things he can do would be legendary if anybody knew about them.” Seraph shrugged. “In the end, I like being in service to somebody whose dreams for greatness are matched by their ability to achieve that greatness.”
“A little transparent, aren’t you,” Narime muttered, glaring at Seraph. “I’ll admit I betrayed the Federation, but I have always been a Guardian of Kurai first and foremost. You’re just in it for the power.”
“No, I’m in it for the ride,” Seraph said.
The two women stared each other down. Standing across the table, Anna ran a hair through her blonde hair in confusion.
This wasn’t an atmosphere that helped Nathan calm down.
He slipped his bookmark into place, snapped the book shut, and drained his brandy. The women jumped at the sound his book made, then watched as he walked out of the tent.
“You scared him away,” Narime said.
“Don’t sound so disappointed. You can go find him in his tent later,” Seraph said.
“And then I’ll have to fight his possessive catgirl over him. Do you know—”
Nathan would never find out what Seraph did or didn’t know, as he walked too far away from the command tent to hear its occupants.
Tartus was lit up. Warm light bathed its buildings, and magical lights glowed brilliantly around its mage towers. The city was small by the standards of western Doumahr, and it had only a handful of large buildings. But those were enough to make it stand out from the farmland and fields around it.
Nathan wandered for a few minutes. Soldiers saluted as he passed, and several beastkin knights followed him at a distance they probably thought was too far to be easily noticed. Their rapidly wagging tails gave them away in Nathan’s peripheral vision.
Eventually, he found a small clearing on a hill behind his own tent. Summoning a small ball of light, he lay down on the grass and began to read.
His mind wandered as he absorbed knowledge about experiments performed over the past centuries about creating food with magic. While no sorcerer had ever succeeded, most of them recorded their experiments. The mage towers of the major cities maintained extensive experimental records and notes. Some sorcerers collated this information and wrote books on it, saving people like Nathan the effort of going through the records himself. Sometimes the author was wrong, which was the danger of secondhand information. But the more knowledge Nathan gained, the closer he felt to reproducing Kadria’s magic.
He didn’t know how much time passed. Were the beastkin knights still watching him from afar, giggling to each other and talking about the things they wanted to do to him? Had Narime and Seraph stopped arguing?
Did it matter?
Footsteps approached. Nathan’s hand instinctively reached for his sword and the book flapped in the air. He looked in the direction of the sound.
It was only Fei.
He resumed reading.
“Don’t ignore me,” Fei whined.
She dropped down next to him and began to push her way into his arms. He raised the book to prevent it from being damaged as she wormed and writhed against him.
Then she froze, realizing she had gone the wrong way. Her face was between his legs and her ass was firmly in his face. He steadfastly tried to look over it at his book but found his task difficult.
There was a bushy black tail waving in front of his face. Every time it passed by, it blocked his view of his book, but not of the rear sticking out in front of him.
“Whoops,” Fei said.
She tried to turn around, which only made things more awkward. There wasn’t enough room between his arms. She pulled her legs in, but then got stuck and tried to push them out.
“You’re going to snap my arms off if you keep that up,” Nathan said. He let go of the book and spreadeagled himself on the grass.
“I figured the book would break first,” Fei said.
“It’s enchanted to be quite sturdy. Do you think a mage tower is going to lend out books to Bastions without thinking about the risk of damage? They want to dig this out of the rubble after the demons burn down half the Empire,” Nathan said.
“For a book?” Fei’s tone was incredulous.
“They’re sorcerers. Knowledge is more important than a few million measly lives,” Nathan said.
“Aren’t you a sorcerer?” Fei said.
“A pretty bad one. I make a better Bastion,” he said.
“If you’re a bad sorcerer, I don’t know if I want to meet a good one,” Fei said.
She curled up against him and nestled her head in the crook of his neck. Within moments, a purring sound rose from her.
Giving up on the idea of finishing his book, Nathan set it aside. He stroked Fei’s hair with his hands, running his fingers through her messy hair. It needed to be cut. Not only had it grown almost a foot since he had met her, but it had also become a tangled mess of split ends and knots.
“If you don’t take care of your hair, you need to keep it shorter,” Nathan said.
&
nbsp; She let out a whine. “I take care of it at home.”
“You mean I take care of it. You beg me to wash your hair every time we shower together,” he said. Which was practically every day.
If Fei didn’t have Nathan for the night, she would usually find him in the morning for a shower. He didn’t mind taking care of her tail, but at some point, it had transformed to taking care of her in general. Most of the time it wasn’t even lewd. She genuinely wanted him to wash her and preened after a good brushing of her hair and tail.
“Tonight?” Fei asked, eyes hopeful.
“Narime complained about you being possessive,” Nathan warned. “You’re being very physical lately.” She pouted at him. “Maybe tomorrow.”
She perked back up and resumed purring.
After a few moments, she said, “It’s not my fault I’m like this. Your pills suck.”
They did?
“The rutting? You’re still feeling it?”
“It’s never stopped. Some days are better than others, but it’s always a constant impulse. I never get so bad I feel the need to push you down and ride you for a few days, but I always need you.” Fei got up on all fours and stared directly into Nathan’s eyes. “We’re going to have all the time in the world to get this over with once we’re done, right?”
“Rutting doesn’t work like that,” Nathan said. “You’re going to be like this for most of the next year. Then after that, you’ll feel like this for a few weeks every year.”
Fei’s expression dropped. “Whaaaaaat?” Then she perked back up. “Then can’t we just get it over with?” She giggled and reached a hand down his pants. “I’m more than ready for some kittens.”
“If it was that easy, I’d be more than willing,” Nathan said, running a hand over Fei’s belly. She gasped at his touch, eyes wide. “But it doesn’t work. I’m sure you remember the older women in your village vanishing with their husbands every so often?”
Fei blinked. “Oh. Is that what that was? Huh. Never thought of it that way.”
She slumped against him. He rubbed her head.
The two of them rested in silence for several minutes. Her purring didn’t resume, but that suited him fine. The sound of the surrounding camp kept him company. His hand ran through Fei’s hair and tail, and he let his mind wander.
For once, it didn’t wander to things he shouldn’t think about. He wondered about what Fei had asked him. He wondered about what would happen if he indulged Fei and gave her what she had asked for, even though it wouldn’t really help her.
Is that what he wanted? He had never considered children before. The world had always been too dangerous.
Or was that an excuse? Would the world ever not be dangerous? Nathan didn’t know.
“Nathan,” Fei said suddenly.
He grunted in response, not paying much attention.
“Why do you know so much more than everybody else?” she asked.
“I’ve mentioned before. In the Academy—” he tried to say.
“We both went to the Academy, and I don’t remember those sorts of books. And my meisters didn’t know half the things you do,” Fei said. Her tone wasn’t accusatory. She spoke calmly, as if talking about the things she had done while wandering around the camp.
“The old lady fox knows super sorcery, and you still amazed her. Alice and Anna have their own libraries and tutors, but they listen to you talk the same way I do. Seraph is a spymaster and amazing Champion that has taught me lots, but you know more than her. You even bossed around Leopold when the Messenger came.”
Nathan didn’t say anything. Instead, he stared at the stars in the sky and dwelled on his mistake.
Of course it was Fei who realized.
The Jafeila from his timeline was far worldlier than the Fei pressed against him. But both women were sharper than they appeared to be at first blush.
Fei asked questions about everything and soaked up knowledge like a sponge. She watched and listened to others. Her knack for eavesdropping on people and tagging along for conversations she had no role in was perennial. She formed opinions fast, but changed them almost as quickly.
“Nathan?” Fei asked.
“How long have you suspected something?” he asked.
“Um, nothing made sense when you brought Sen back and she just…” Fei trailed off and looked thoughtful. “Well, she just slipped into your bed like she belonged there. At first, I was jealous. And a bit terrified. I thought she might have used magic on you. I knew so little about magic, and she used a lot of it. But she was so friendly and clearly looked up to you. And she also acted differently.”
That made sense. His conversion of Sen would have looked jarring, given she flipped from hate to love in the course of roughly five minutes, so far as Fei saw.
“Then I looked back at earlier stuff, and everything was odd,” Fei said. “You immediately made me a Champion. You knew about the enemy plan almost the moment you arrived. Everybody was shocked that you built Gharrick Pass without help.”
Fei arched her back and tried to look Nathan in the eyes. He grabbed her by her sides and flipped her over. She giggled.
Well, if she was giggling, then he took that as a sign that she didn’t hate him.
“Anything else?” Nathan asked.
“The amethyst,” Fei said. She placed a hand over her sapphire. “You went for it the moment Leopold gave you the three gems. I know you said that it was a standard gem for new Champions, but…” Her voice dropped to a barely audible whisper. “That was my gem, wasn’t it? I was supposed to take it. And I didn’t.”
Nathan had given Narime shit over being a terrible actor, but apparently, he was far worse. Somehow, he had given away his secret to Fei within days of arriving in the timeline.
He imagined that Kadria was struggling to breathe right now. She would be writhing around on the ground, laughing breathlessly at him.
“No, you took the right gem,” Nathan said.
“Eh?” Fei squeaked.
“You are your own person. I gave you the choice, and you chose your own gem for your own reasons,” he said.
“But I…” she trailed off, her voice choking up. “I only picked it because I figured it was the one you least expected. You kept eyeing the amethyst, and I figured you knew something. If I chose the wrong gem, you’d have to correct me. Then I could say something, and you would have told me about everything. Like how Sen and Sunstorm and Seraph know everything.”
Fei’s eyes filled with tears. Her ears flattened against her head and her tail stopped swishing behind her.
With a breathy sigh, Nathan flattened her hair with one hand. She squeaked and stared at him.
“You silly kitten,” Nathan said. “You should have said something ages ago. Seraph doesn’t know.” Or if she did—which she probably did, if Fei knew—then she hadn’t confronted him yet. “Sen and Sunstorm only know because they have a very special reason to know. You’re the first person to find out.”
“I am?”
“You are,” Nathan said. He hoped he didn’t regret this.
Then again, Fei trusted him. He should trust her. And hopefully avoid situations where she did things purely to bait a reaction from him. The choice of a sapphire had worked out brilliantly, but the revelation of why she chose it stung.
He frowned suddenly as his mind kicked into gear. Things didn’t add up, but he filed away the thought for later. Confronting Fei about it was pointless right now.
Taking a deep breath, Nathan steeled himself to reveal the truth. Or as much of it as he was willing to reveal.
“I’m from the future,” Nathan said. “Or a future. It’s complicated, but I’m from a world where you were my Champion, but everything went wrong. I’ve come back to stop that.”
“Wrong,” Fei repeated. “Is that why your eyes get distant sometimes?”
“Probably,” Nathan said.
“Because I’ve seen that look in the beastkin who return from campaigns. It’s part
of why they like you. When you came out and met them, you had the same look in your eyes that they did. They knew immediately that you understood them and knew how to lead, unlike all the other nobles who had never seen real war,” Fei said.
Damn, so that was what was behind her outburst before the battle to recapture Vera’s towers. The beastkin veterans had gossiped. Figures that the old bastards recognized like. They were used to living in a meat grinder, and that was the best way to describe Nathan’s timeline. An endless meat grinder that consumed every nation, one by one.
“But yes, a lot went wrong. Too much. But you’re not the Jafeila from my timeline. You’re Fei, and I love you for being Fei.” Nathan closed his arms around her, and she giggled at the contact. “So, don’t worry about it so much. I know the things I do because I’ve seen a lot more of the world than my past suggests. But I’m here to make the future a lot better than the one I saw.”
“That’s good,” Fei said. “And thank you for telling me. I was really worried about what would happen.” She paused. “Um, does that mean I get to be part of your secret conversations with Sen and Sunstorm?”
“Yes, although you might struggle to keep up,” Nathan said. “And you can’t tell anybody that I don’t give you permission to tell.”
“I know. I haven’t told anybody else so far, have I?” she said.
True.
He laid in the grass with her in his arms. It was pleasant enough that he dropped the one remaining topic he had in mind.
Namely, if Fei had really chosen the sapphire because he hadn’t expected it, why hadn’t he detected that instability during the gemming ceremony?
Chapter 36
The rest of his Champions arrived several days later. Sunstorm appeared in the command tent that morning, and her army reached Nathan’s in the afternoon.
Sen and Sunstorm wasted no time in catching up with Nathan. Once their soldiers began to encamp, both of them walked into the command tent and dragged Nathan out of it.
“You realize we have a battle tomorrow,” Nathan said.
“They can plan it,” Sen said, gesturing to the other Champions and officers in the command tent. Sunstorm nodded in agreement.
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