“Wow…” Kate says. “So, that’s how you got stuck with her, then. And what is your plan? Spend the rest of your night doing night shifts so the stillwater can sleep comfortably in your tent?”
“I’m not planning to stay here all night,” I say. “As soon as Hadrik and Daren’s shift begins, I’ll ask them to set up a tent for her, so she can leave me in peace. But I figured that I may as well come here and chat with you, given that I was already up.”
“Oh?” Kate asks. “And what was it that you wanted to talk with me about?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “Lots of things. It feels like it’s been ages since we’ve had a chance to talk, in private.”
“You’re right…” Kate says. “It has been a while. I think the last time we’ve had a private conversation was that time when we were celebrating our release from the golden fox’s collars. Back when… Rose was still alive…”
Kate’s words hit me like a dagger through my chest. I suddenly realize that I’ve been completely avoiding thinking about Rose ever since that day when we held a toast with Enrique in her memory. Even when I promised myself that I would not avoid thinking about her because of her death, I still managed to do it. I guess some things are easier said than done, after all.
“Yes… back when Rose was alive…” I say, and then we both stay silent for a few moments.
“So… how have things been going with Leila?” I say, trying to change the subject.
“They’ve been going… great,” Kate says, with a faint smile. “We’ve been talking a lot about what our lives have been like since we left the Beacon. It’s been a long time. We both had many stories to tell…”
“So, you’re back to being friends again, then?” I ask her.
“What do you mean?” Kate says.
“Well, at the beginning, you weren’t really talking to each other,” I say. “So, I thought that maybe you might have had an argument or something, before she left the Beacon, which made it difficult for you to begin a conversation.”
“Oh, no, it’s not that…” Kate says. “It was just that…”
She pauses.
“You see,” she says, “Leila and I were never exactly friends back when we were at the Beacon… I spent most of my time with Diane and her brother, and Leila wasn’t really allowed to socialize much with the rest of us, because she was a lessathi. But even so, the first time when I found out that she died, I was devastated. Gods, why did I have to believe the lies of those lessathi, who said that she was dead? Why did I not try to look for her?”
“Hey, even if you did, it’s not like you would have made any progress, right?” I say. “Leila’s lived all of her life here in Varathia with her adoptive father, so you wouldn’t have had any more luck in finding her than you’ve had in trying to reach Diane. Don’t beat yourself up over it too much. The important thing is that she was kept safe all this time, thanks to that lessathi caretaker that she calls her father.”
“Yes, you’re right,” Kate says. “I really owe a lot to her father. I hope we’ll meet him when we reach Ollendor, so I can express my gratitude to him.”
She pauses again.
“What about you, Barry?” Kate says. “How’s it going with your notebook? Have you found anything useful?”
“It’s hard to tell,” I say. “I have a lot of information in my notebook, but there’s also a lot of stuff missing. If only I could somehow figure out how to activate these magic stats from the stat device, it would be a lot easier to fill in the notes with the details I need, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to unlock those hidden stats by myself.”
“Do you think that Leila’s father might be able to help?” Kate says.
“It’s a possibility,” I say. “But I won’t get my hopes up for now. From what the goblin general told me, in order to activate these hidden stats, I’d need some secret codes that should only be accessible to the top brass of the lessathi, and I doubt that Leila’s father would have any reason to know them.”
As Kate and I take another short break from talking, I suddenly remember what Melindra told me in the tent, about Kate having feelings for me. Should I discuss this with her? No, no, no, it would only end up placing us in an awkward situation. But then again, if I never talk to Kate about this, things will never get cleared up.
Maybe I could find a way to bring up the subject in a subtle manner, without shocking her too much. I should try to let the conversation flow naturally, and when I find the right opportunity, I will introduce the idea as an afterthought, just to see how she reacts. Yeah, that could work! That’s what I’ll do.
“So, Kate…” I say. “I was just wondering about something…”
“Yes?” Kate says.
“You wouldn’t by any chance happen to have any feelings for me, would you?” I say.
Damn it, that wasn’t subtle at all, was it?
“…Have you lost your mind?” Kate says, as she’s looking straight at me, unsure what to make of me.
“No, wait!” I say. “I know that it looks as if I’m just asking you this completely out of the blue, but the truth is that there was something that Melindra said to me earlier that drove me to ask you this question.”
“Melindra again…” Kate says. “What did she say to you?”
“Well…” I say. “She told me that you might have feelings for me… because of that look you gave her when she grabbed me by the arm, yesterday, while she was pretending that we were a couple.”
“Oh…” Kate says, as she gets a thoughtful look on her face, and turns her gaze to the side. “I see…”
After a few seconds of contemplation, Kate once again looks me straight in the eye, and she continues to speak.
“It’s true that I was a bit shocked when I first saw that scene between the two of you,” Kate says. “I’d seen you having a private conversation with her only a few minutes prior, and I was worried that you might have done something that you would later come to regret. Obviously, I realized soon afterwards that it was all only a joke, but I still think you should be careful around Melindra. There is no telling what goes through that woman’s mind. And, regarding any feelings that she claims I may have for you… rest assured that my main reason for looking out for you is because I care for you as a friend, and I wouldn’t want you to make a mistake that would be very hard to fix later on.”
“Hold on, did you just say this was your main reason for looking out for me?” I say, with half a grin. “So you are implying that there might also have been other reasons?”
Kate frowns at me, when she hears my question.
“You can be impossible sometimes, do you know that?” Kate says.
“Hey, you’re the one who chose to phrase your words that way, not me!” I say.
“Well, regardless of how you may choose to interpret my words,” Kate says, “I think we can both agree that what’s important right now is to focus on the tournament, and on our objectives.”
“Oh, yes, totally,” I say.
“If you’re still not satisfied with the answers I’ve given you,” Kate says, “then we can continue our discussion at a later time, after we’ve all managed to survive this tournament to its very end.”
“Don’t you mean, after I win the tournament?” I tell her, with a smirk.
“Of course,” Kate says, and then she smiles faintly. “After you win.”
She then conjures an ice dagger out of thin air, and she starts flinging it upwards, and catching it with her hand, repeatedly, as she continues to speak to me.
“You know,” Kate says, “you should consider yourself very lucky that I’m not actually planning to compete against you in this tournament. With your non-existent protection spells, and your unreliable ranged attacks, you would have no way of even touching me, while I’d be floating high above in an ice cage, raining down icicles upon you.”
“I don’t know,” I say. “I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”
“Why not?” Kate a
sks.
“Well, the winner of the fight would still depend on a number of factors,” I say. “For example, if the fight were to happen underground, or inside a building, you wouldn’t be able to fly away to safety. And even if we were to fight on an open field, I could still get the upper hand if we were to start our fight relatively close to each other. From what I’ve seen in the past, you are particularly vulnerable to surprise attacks, so if I were to get close to you faster than you could react to defend yourself, then I think I’d stand a fair chance at— Hold on a sec! This discussion that we’re having right now… it’s only hypothetical, right? You wouldn’t actually try to kill me if the tournament pinned us against each other… would you?”
“I would not,” Kate says. “Would you?”
“I… don’t think I could, no…” I say.
“Well, then,” Kate says, as she makes her ice dagger vanish into thin air, “In that case, I suppose we should both be feeling lucky that we won’t be competing against each other.”
She pauses.
“But I think you already know that things will not go as smoothly with Daren,” Kate continues. “The two of you are practically the only members of our group who are actually aiming to win this tournament, so if you both continue on your current path, you will eventually have no other choice than to fight each other. There can be only one winner of the Magium tournament.”
“Yeah… I know,” I say.
As the two of us remain silent for a while, we eventually see Daren’s tent getting opened from all the way across the camp, and soon afterwards, Daren also comes out, and he starts heading towards us.
“Barry?” Daren asks, when he gets closer to us. “What are you doing here? I was pretty sure that Kate was the only one who took the first shift.”
“I could ask you the same question,” I say. “Wasn’t your shift supposed to begin in an hour or so?”
“An hour and a half,” Daren says. “But I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about that fight we had today, and trying to think of ways in which we could have handled ourselves better. So, I figured that I may as well come here and relieve Kate of her shift early, so at least she could get some rest.”
“Oh, well my story is a little longer than that,” I say.
I then begin to tell him about how Melindra came into my tent because she forgot to pack her own, and how I eventually let her sleep inside, while I left to join Kate on her shift.
“So that’s what happened, then,” Daren says. “Alright… Barry, you come with me and we’ll set up Melindra’s new tent. Kate, you should go to sleep. I’ll take the rest of your shift.”
“I will take you up on that offer,” Kate says, as she gets up from the ground. “Good luck with… Melindra’s tent.”
She then starts heading towards her own tent, as Daren and I head towards his, in order to get a spare tent from his backpack. Once we are done setting it up, I go back to my own tent to wake up Melindra.
“Hey, Melindra, wake up!” I tell her.
“Mmmnnn…” Melindra says, with her eyes half-closed, in a sleepy voice. “Let me sleep a little longer…”
“You can sleep as much as you want in your own tent, but not here,” I say.
“But I don’t… have a tent…” Melindra says, in the same sleepy voice. “I told you that I forgot to—”
“I’m talking about one of Daren’s tents,” I say. “I spoke to him, and he agreed to lend you one for the night.”
“He did?” Melindra says, this time actually opening her eyes.
“Yes, now go sleep over there,” I say. “Daren will show you where it is.”
“Alright, alright…” Melindra says, as she gets up and prepares to exit the tent. “I’m going.”
As soon as Melindra walks out, I enter my tent once more, I close the zipper behind me, and I fall asleep almost as soon as I put my head on the pillow.
When I wake up the next morning from the sound of people dismantling their tents, I see that there is barely any light coming through my tent from outside. As I open the tent’s zipper, I realize that this is because of the fact that the sky is currently filled with dark clouds, and there isn’t even a small glimpse of the sun, even though it must have risen for at least an hour. It appears that most of the others have already woken up, and presumably, have already had their breakfast.
Not long after I walk out of my tent, Melindra comes rushing towards me, with an unusually serious expression on her face.
“Listen,” Melindra says, as she stops in front of me. “I didn’t mean to kick you out of your own tent last night.”
“Yes, I know that,” I say. “It’s fine.”
“No, it’s not fine!” Melindra says. “All I wanted to do was to sneak silently into your tent, doze off for a few hours and then walk away unnoticed. I didn’t mean to cause all this ruckus!”
“So what?” I ask her, confused. “You got your tent, didn’t you?”
“Yes, but that’s not the point!” Melindra says. “The point is that I didn’t mean to cause you that much trouble, when you were the one helping me!”
“Huh…” I say, as I give her a long, pondering look. “So, you are capable of giving a damn about other people, then…”
I pause for a second before I continue.
“But why would you choose to act the way you do, if that is the case?” I say.
“What are you talking about?” Melindra says.
“Well,” I say, “from what I’ve seen of your behavior yesterday, you never really seem to care about what people think of you. You don’t make an effort to remember anyone’s names, you don’t stop to think whether speaking your mind bluntly would annoy the people around you or not, and you didn’t give me the impression that you’d care much if your habit of provoking reactions from people would cause the others to become upset at you.”
“And why would I care if the others become upset at me?” Melindra says. “I don’t need them to be my friends. I just need them to get the job done.”
“But do you need them to be your enemies?” I say.
“Eiden did not become my enemy when I acted like this with him,” Melindra says.
“Well, most people are not Eiden!” I say.
“But that doesn’t mean that I need to change how I live my life just to accommodate others!” Melindra says.
“I’m not telling you to change your entire lifestyle,” I say. “I’m just telling you to not piss off everyone that you meet on purpose. Can’t you at least do that much? Or would you rather spend the rest of our days on this journey without even being able to ask someone the simple favor of lending you a tent for the night?”
Melindra is now looking at me with her eyebrows furrowed, and with another pouting expression on her face.
“Fine,” she says. “Maybe I could change my behavior a little. But only a little.”
“Well, it’s a start,” I say. “Anyway, I think we should be getting ready to leave, soon. I see that the others are almost done with dismantling their tents, so I’m guessing that they’ve already eaten their breakfast.”
“Yeah, we’re already done eating,” Melindra says. “You should talk to Flower about making you some food. She remembered some new recipes after watching the arena, which are supposedly rare dishes, meant for kings. Archer porcupine pie and trampler stew, I think they were called. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to grab my backpack from inside your tent.”
“Wait, when did you leave your backpack in there?” I say, as Melindra crawls into my tent.
“I flew it over you with my wind magic while you were still asleep,” Melindra says. “Okay, I found it.”
She then exits my tent with her backpack in her hand, and she heads towards the river bank, to collect more of her rocks. Once I’m done dismantling my tent and handing it back to Hadrik, I go to Flower, in order to ask her to magically create some food for me. I spend the next twenty minutes or so savoring my meal, and then I go join the others,
who seem to be preparing for our departure. Once we’re all ready to go, Melindra takes the lead, and we all begin to follow her, as we walk along the river’s bank, just like yesterday.
We travel in a straight line for the next hour or so, and every once in a while, we see one or two mages, who are too busy to take notice of us, while filling their backpacks with pinecones as if their life depended on it.
“What do you guys suppose they’re doing?” Hadrik asks us, as we walk past two mages that were busy collecting pinecones. “Shouldn’t they just be checking to see if the pinecones light up in their hands? Why would they go out of their way to actually collect them?”
“Maybe they found a detector, and they’re taking the pinecones to it,” I say.
“I doubt it,” Melindra says. “If they really had access to a detector, they would have taken it with them. It can be easily carried in one hand.”
“It’s possible that they know a person who has a detector, but won’t give it to them,” I say. “We can’t know for sure.”
“I suppose…” Melindra says.
“Well, whatever the reason,” Daren says, “there’s at least one thing that we can be certain of. And it’s the fact that in some way or another, these people managed to figure out the fact that they can’t make the pinecones light up by themselves.”
“But they still don’t know that the glowing pinecones can only be found in the sacred forests,” Melindra says. “Otherwise, they wouldn’t be wasting their time around these parts. As long as they don’t know this crucial piece of information, they still have a long way to go until they can complete their objective.”
“To be honest, what worries me the most right now has nothing to do with those mages gathering pinecones,” Daren says. “Look at the sky. It’s only been getting darker since we woke up this morning. I have a feeling that there will be a storm coming soon.”
“Do you get storms often in Varathia?” Hadrik asks Flower.
“No, they’re pretty rare,” Flower says. “But when we do get one, it tends to be rather nasty. Especially in the summer.”
“In that case, we’d better watch out for falling trees,” Daren says. “Also, we should expect to get soaked to the bone once it starts pouring, so we’re probably going to have to take a break to dry up near a fire afterwards.”
Magium Page 36
