Eight 5.5: Random Encounters and Stray Thoughts

Nothing else kept us in Bashruuta, so the next day we headed to Albei at first light. Within the first couple of hours walking, though, we had to put down the zombies of a dusk elk, shambling hellmouth, and brace of fire badgers. Quite a few animals had lost their lives in the flooding, and their undead bodies lingered to infest the woods, leaving a sense of both tension and fatigue among the forest spirits.

All our opponents’ silverlight went to Fala who needed to catch up to Yuki and me.

The condition of the road also slowed us down. There were sections that had been submerged, which meant rubble and fallen trees blocking the path. While still near Bashruuta, we ran into militia teams working to clear the way, but those encounters became less frequent the farther we traveled and eventually stopped entirely once we passed the shrine at Nurus.

It felt like we traveled through uninhabited lands after that; the road was hardly visible through the dirt and debris left over from the storm. At least we didn’t have to trudge through mud. The recent spate of sunny days had dried things out, with only the most low-lying of the land left a muddy mess.

We stopped for a meal at a little after eleven in the morning. By then, we’d been walking for over five hours, and my stomach was rumbling from hunger. The original plan was to eat on the go, so that we’d make Albei by nightfall, but that didn’t seem likely based on the pace we’d been setting. More probable was that we’d only get as far as Huwata instead.

Lunch consisted of tamales stuffed with a mixture of venison and young greens, still warm from the Wholesome Ox’s kitchen thanks to our Hoarder’s Pocket. The flavor was better than I’d expected from the inn’s cooks, though that might’ve been the day’s exertions talking.

We were about to restart our travels when Mumu messaged: ‘I just left a meeting with Silasenei. She’s anxious to debrief you as soon as you arrive and will clear her schedule as necessary. Yuki tells me that it’ll likely be tomorrow morning, is that right?’

Assuming we don’t see any further delays, yes. I shrugged, trusting the feeling to carry over the connection. We may run into more undead along the way, though.

‘Understood, I’ll keep Silasenei informed as necessary. The rest of the team and I will be staying in Albei for the next two or three days. More and more of the undead are attacking here too. The land soldiers at the walls have been busy.’

We should be able to join you for the trip back to Voorhei, I thought.

‘Good, it’ll be safer for everyone involved, and—’ Mumu sent.

But I caught her off when the Deer God nudged my attention. He’d sensed a predator’s gaze upon us. I personally didn’t see anything, and a quick ping to Yuki and Fala let me know that they hadn’t noticed any threats either.

I’ll call you later, I told Mumu. Something’s happening here.

‘Good hunting,’ she replied and then quickly signed off.

“Do we have a direction?” I prompted the Deer God.

His response was a moment of consideration, and then I was directed to look up. Invisible to the naked eye, a giant bird was swooping down on us, using the sun behind him to further obscure his attack.

Merohalein (Rockhead Goose, Silvered)

Talents: Hidden Attacker, Wilier than Most, Hard-Headed, Basher, Stomach for Anything

There was no blurring as he flew, so it wasn’t a camouflage ability hiding him from sight but true invisibility instead. That was a rare and lethal threat.

I cast a Dog’s Agility and unslung my bow. Rapid-fire, I shot at my quarry—bang, bang, bang—yet the spell-infused arrows bounced off of his skull. More importantly, the unerring trajectories had gone awry and were drawn to where the bone was thickest and widest.

That had to be one of the most peculiar talents I’d ever seen. Like, who’d want to make it easier for their enemy to attack their head? The answer was apparently this Merohalein.

Fala had dropped into the road’s pavers to prepare for the assault, a handful of stone javelins emerging in her place. We’d worked together enough to know how we’d split our quarry’s attention and get around his defenses.

Yet the goose didn’t seem to appreciate having his ambush spoiled. Before we could put our strategy into action, Merohalein aborted his dive and winged away low across the treetops. Fala only managed to get a couple shots off before he was out of view. My Prey of the Hunter hooked into him, yet he didn’t slow his retreat once.

I stood in place for twenty minutes afterward, thinking he’d come back, but the cowardly goose had traveled dozens of miles with seemingly no intent to return—at least not to this spot.

‘We’ll let the officials in Huwata know about the threat,’ Yuki said.

Gah, it’s so frustrating, I replied. Clever enemies are the worst.

###

As the morning turned into afternoon and the sun continued its travels across the sky, a few more predators came sniffing around, though none committed to an attack. Sometimes we spotted them, like a lone dusk sabertooth whose main talent was Sharp-Fanged; other times all we got was the Deer God’s warning we were being observed.

That hiatus ended at around four o’clock. We were just coming up to a fork in the road when we heard the sound of fighting farther along the path toward Huwata. Fala immediately leaped into the figurine hanging from my neck, and I dashed ahead with Dog’s Agility. On the other side of a downed pine tree, I found a militia team battling an undead black bear. She was about twice normal size, and my camera revealed that her remaining talents were Quick Claws and Unrepentant Rage.

At my approach, the bear spun instantly to charge me. My bow was already in hand, so I sent an spell-laden arrow at her heart. The attack’s impact billowed the sagging muscles of her torso and knocked her back a step.

Yuki teleported me to the bear’s side a moment later, and I let go my bow to grab my spear, thrusting it between the monster’s ribs to shatter her core. Stepping back, I let the body fall in a heap afterward.

A stream of darklight hissed out of the gaps I’d created in the flesh. Looking closer, I saw that the bear was covered with cuts; they’d just not been deep enough. Another series of quick examinations then showed that the militia team was being led by a land soldier with three solid talents, including Cool-Headed. The others on the team appeared to be a mix of farmers and artisans.

Two of them were wounded, one quite badly. The muscles of his right arm had been shredded, and his compatriots were doing everything they could to staunch the bleeding. None of them appeared to be able to use magic, though, which was what the man truly needed.

Without it, he’ll lose the arm and probably his life, I thought.

‘Area’s clear,’ Yuki said, and I felt the Deer God’s agreement.

It meant I could start dealing with the aftermath now, so I asked Fala, Do you want the exchange for healing?

She responded with a subtle shake of the figurine’s head. ‘Ikfael is dead and must stay that way for the time being.’

He needs— I started.

But the land soldier interrupted the thought by coming forward and bowing deeply. I noted a fine scar ran along the top of her scalp. “Thank you, Honored, for your aid. We would’ve been lost without it.” She licked her lips, her ongoing anxiety clear on her face. “Do you perhaps know the spell Nature’s Spring? Can we beseech you for its use on our wounded?”

She was brave, this land soldier. It took guts to ask someone obviously silvered for help. The problem was Nature’s Spring wouldn’t be enough for the shredded arm. The spell was great at enhancing the body’s natural healing abilities, but traumatic injuries needed a more powerful response, namely Healing Water.

“Isn’t that Eight Storm Caller?” I heard whispered from one of the militia members behind her.

“He’s got that spell…” another replied.

How much trouble do I want to get into with the Healer’s Lodge? I wondered.

Technically, using Healing Water on anyone who wasn’t in my family or lodge was illegal. And while I’d broken that law many times previously, the people I’d healed were trustworthy. They’d been either my neighbors in Voorhei or the land soldier stationed there during the Long Dark. People who could keep a secret.

Then it occurred to me: Do I even need to worry about the law anymore?

I strode over to the injured man to place my hand upon his shoulder. Nature’s Spring flowed from me into him, and Yuki doubled the cast to increase the spell’s strength. The aim was to buy me some time to consider the situation.

A quick poll of my allies returned the following results: the Deer God didn’t care for legalities and thought I should heal anyone who needed it; Yuki agreed with him, further adding that everyone in the Healer’s Lodge should go jump into the ocean; and Fala thought that that was a wonderful idea.

This was a consensus I hadn’t expected. Sure, their lodge had been a pain in the butt for years, but the healers were still a powerful faction within Albei and could make things difficult for our family and friends.

So, I sent the question to Mumu, and there… there was the hesitation I thought I might see in response. I could feel the care by which she crafted her answer. ‘The healers hold life and death in their hands,’ she sent. ‘That is the source of their worldly influence, and they will act to protect it. This you already know.’

And? I sense an “and” coming.

‘And there are none more influential than the silvered,’ she sent, ‘especially when it comes to anything touching upon their authority.’

For a moment, I considered her diplomatic response. You’re not going to tell me what you think I should do, are you?

I felt Mumu shaking her head. ‘I’ve given you what I can but this struggle is your own, Little Pot. It is how you determine your path.’

The doubled Nature’s Spring was doing what it needed to: the man’s pulse had steadied and the bleeding had stopped. The arm would be crippled without a better healing spell, however. The muscles were too torn apart for there to be any other result.

Mine was the authority of water: of nourishing life and drowning it too, the calm river and the crashing wave both. What did water demand? Nothing truly. It settled into the lowest places, content to be where it was until moved by forces gravitational, tectonic, and magical.

So, am I moved? I asked myself, and the answer rang within me like a bell: Hell yes, I am. Though I don’t need to be stupid about it. While I’m planning to tell Silasenei about my new path, not everyone else needs to know.

I met the land soldier’s eyes and said, “You should take your people back now, but don’t worry about your man here, I will see him safely returned. I just want to make sure he’s stable first.”

A thread of hope climbed through the land soldier’s spirit as she registered the implications of my request. That is, what it meant for me to ask for fewer witnesses and to create an opportunity for plausible deniability.

Had she recognized me too? As I’d overheard earlier, Eight Storm Caller was known to possess the Healing Water spell. I didn’t see anything that indicated it in her spirit; perhaps she was just good at reading intent.

With a hurried gesture, she gathered the others on her team to get them going, and they all quickly bowed before leaving. As soon as they were out of sight, I pulled the stopper from my water skin and poured the contents on the man’s wounds, the Healing Water spell flowing through me as easily as breathing.

I never got tired of seeing the miracle of bones fusing and flesh reknitting. His arm became whole once more, glowing with vibrant health. And all I’d needed was the one cast. In the past, a wound like that would’ve taken at least two.

Once his shock wore off, the man dropped into a kneeling bow with his forehead glued to the ground. He introduced himself as Afastu, a potter of middling rank in the Artisan’s Lodge of Huwata.

In his late fifties, Afastu likely had another decade of work left in him, which I’d saved along with his life. He explained that there were several journeymen in his family’s workshop, with none of them ready to take over. They were still developing and lacked the required skills.

Eventually, I pried him up from his bow, so that we could get going again. Even so, Afastu insisted on walking ten paces behind me, which was silly. The place for him was beside me so that I could protect him. Obviously, he’d not spent much time among hunters.

###

Huwata was a town to the northeast of Albei known for its small industries like leatherworking and woodcarving. The western boundary abutted a tributary to the Sootyel, and there was usually a fair amount of river trade heading to and from the larger city.

The town walls were about forty feet tall, with a network of temporary ditches surrounding them meant to channel the flood waters toward the river. By that point, though, they’d become filled with stagnant pools.

The water didn’t seem to mind, because… why would it? Either it would soak into the ground here or evaporate to join the weather cycle, eventually returning to the ground as rain. Until then, this place was as good as any other. Water was at its heart equanimous—accepting and treating everything with the same unconditional regard.

I came to a stop to contemplate the stagnant water. There was an important insight here, just at the cusp of forming, and I felt I had to wait for it.

Afastu also came to also look into the ditch. Eventually, though, he started to shift from one leg to the other, anxious to be within the safety of the walls.

“You can go,” I told him. “You don’t need to wait for me.”

He shook his head and said, “I cannot treat my zasha like that.”

Which was his own business. I hadn’t healed him for his gratitude, so I tuned him out and focused on the water again. For about an hour, I felt the way it settled so comfortably in the dirt. The earth was already soaked through, so it was just a matter of waiting until the current equilibrium between water, earth, sun, and air was broken, one way or another.

After that hour, a notification popped up:

The Hydrodynamics skill has increased from 7 to 8.

Unfortunately, the insight itself eluded me, darting away like a fish every time I came close. When I checked the skill, I didn’t find anything new except for the memory of the time spent staring into the ditch.

You’re so strange, I told the World Spirit.

Unsurprisingly, it didn’t deign to respond.

I turned with a sigh toward the crowd that had formed around me while I’d been meditating. Both Huwata’s reeve and town head were present along with an escort of land soldiers, including the one I’d met earlier on the road.

Many of the faces were familiar. They were people who’d been frequent spectators at the Tournament of Masks, including the town’s leadership. The world speaker, though, was notably absent.

‘She’s an ally of the former hierophant,’ Yuki reminded me. ‘Iseld called her a toady.’

I nodded in reply, and the reeve took it as a sign she could step forward. There was a nervousness to her spirit at odds with the stoic expression on her face. “Honored, welcome to Huwata. We heard about your valor in helping our town clear the roads. You have our gratitude. Did our militia serve you well in showing you the way here?”

I glanced aside at the man whose arm I’d healed. Apparently, he’d been my guide, or that was how the story was supposed to go—a way to neatly sidestep the potential conflict with the Healer’s Lodge, assuming everyone involved promised to never reveal the truth.

Fine beads of sweat gathered on the reeve’s forehead as she waited for my response. Just because I didn’t mind tussling with the healers, it didn’t mean others were. Most would very much appreciate staying out of that fight.

Well, stalemate was a more accurate description of the state of the conflict. Knight Ithia was supposedly still “deciding” who the true owners of the spell were: the hunters or the healers.

Personally, I believed it ought to be like Nature’s Spring, open for anyone to use.

A slow smile spread across my face. I am a Saint of Water, I thought. Wouldn’t it make sense for me to have authority over who can use the spell?

Things were moving within me—currents I couldn’t articulate or even identify—yet I did see the impacts they were having on the people around me. The delay in my response let the reeve’s nervousness spread, with the moist-forehead club getting several new members. They’d begun staring at me like I was an alien who’d dropped out of the sky.

Another thought occurred to me then: What am I doing? Why am I making them wait so long? My authority needs to be more tightly controlled. I’m not here to make these people’s jobs harder.

Suddenly embarrassed, I cleared my throat. “Yes, of course. I have no complaints about this soldier’s conduct. Now, where can I find a good inn and something warm to eat?”

As the reeve began to answer, the shadows around us sharpened into focus. Their edges grew keener, and they somehow gained a presence independent of the person or object casting them.

I only vaguely heard the reeve’s words, something about staying at her family’s house. More important was the recognition that the hunters’ grandmaster had moved up our planned debrief. Silasenei was here.