Sarah stood silently in her room, the lamp flickering as the oil within was gradually used up. Normally she would go to replace the oil but… what was the point now? Soon she would leave Ardglass, the temple, and who knows how long it would be until she could return?
In this world it wasn’t uncommon for people to disappear their whole lives. The world was extremely large, even if they didn’t die – how could they guarantee they wouldn’t get stuck in another part of the continent?
This problem was doubled for those with long lives like Rae. In a tenth of her lifespan, any human friends she makes would most likely be long dead by the time she came around again.
Certain classes humans could study would allow them to extend their lives, but that really only prolonged the issue.
Really what she was worried about… was whether or not Jakobson would still be alive by the time she returned.
Sarah choked back the anxiety she felt and took a deep breath. There was nothing to do about it now. That was a problem for future her.
Suddenly there was a small knock at the door. Sarah looked over startled, who? It didn’t sound like the knocking of an adult…
When she opened the door an extremely short figure rushed into the room wrapping their tiny arms around her. Sarah tensed for a moment but immediately relaxed, her hand came down patting the smaller figures head.
“It’s okay Yisa. It’s okay.” Wrapped around her legs was a small girl Sarah had known for most of her life. This young girl was the spoiled-sweet acolyte in training, Yisanet. Sarah could see tears in the bloodshot eyes of the tiny being. Her tiny body shivered with grief the way only children could.
Sarah knelt down and easily lifted the small girl into her arms.
“It’s okay. I will be back eventually…” Sarah said, however she couldn’t help but feel that her promise was hollow.
Yisanet looked at Sarah in the eyes. Sarah felt guilty, even though Yisanet was so young, she felt as though she had been looked right through. A gentle smile formed on Sarah’s face.
“Are you still you? After…. What Feylin said…” Her small voice quivered slightly, but she did her best to put up a strong front. Sarah nodded, realizing that Yisa had witnessed everything that occurred outside. She sighed, unsure of what to say.
Eventually Sarah reached up and began to fiddle with her own hair. She pulled out a silver hairclip she had received from one of the senior clerics after coming to the temple, and delicately adjusted Yisa’s hair.
“I’m still me Yisa." Sarah slowly stroked the young girls’ brown hair, brushing it out of her face and slipping the hairclip above her ear. "Take this, and consider it a promise. We will meet again. It will just take some time.”
“How long?” Yisa's voice clearly expressed her own distrust.
“I don’t know.” Sarah shook her head. She watched the young girls hand feel the silver clip which now held back her hair off her forehead.
Yisanet had grown up within the temple much the same way Feylin had. She looked up to Jakobson like a father, she looked up to Feylin like an older brother, and Sarah like a sister.
Now… they would be leaving. And not just for a little bit like before… but for a long time.
Yisanet thought she would come to terms with it by the time they returned from their journey to the edge, but she had never been so wrong.
The two spoke for a while longer in the soft lit room. Sarah continued to hold the young red-eyed girl. It was all she could do.
…
Noone watched this from his room as he collected what few personal items he owned. Everything else would already be stored within the cart.
As the time ticked away, Noone sat down and began absorbing what energy he could in the small amount of time left.
His body processed the threads of energy which floated around him, but his mind thought about other things.
“I was able to overwhelm Sally’s energy completely. Although I did use a bit of trickery…” Noone thought. “And she wasn’t being a hundred percent serious either.” Various feelings crossed his mind as he analyzed what occurred out in the courtyard. He had come to realize the gist of what occurred, and it left a bad taste in his mouth for Sally. She was too closed minded, he thought.
"If she was able to fully utilize the blessings of her gods, there was no way I should have been able to overwhelm her." He thought quietly about the energy he felt. It was clear that clerics’ and paladin’s auras were an extension of their gods. Noone figured this must have been helped by the fact they were within their temple, a place already overflowing with life god's blessings.
"Ultimately... even the strength of their auras is merely an extension of what their gods allot to them." In the end, none of this mattered to Noone. Nothing mattered compared to the experience he received
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He was able to feel out the auras of almost everyone in the party.
From the outside it seemed that Noone was stepping up to Sarah’s defense. This raised many questions within the party’s mind. No one except Jakobson knew that Noone had been there to help Sarah advance into a paladin.
No one was as surprised as Sarah though. She felt that she had some understanding of Noone’s personality from their interaction up to this point. He didn’t seem like the type to be so aggressive for someone else’s defense. Not only did Noone protect her, but actively fought back as well.
Noone smiled. This was the impression he wanted to give.
...
An hour passed quickly, and the party began to trickle back into the courtyard. Tobias and Sally stood there, any tense air between the two had evaporated by the end of the hour. Anyone who wasn’t aware of what had happened before would not have been able to sense anything between the two now.
Noone and Raelith walked into the courtyard together, having run into each other in the hall. Noone was unsure whether or not to laugh at how casual she was despite the altercation between her partner and Sarah. Noone was always pleasantly surprised at how casual Rae could be. She always kept her cards very close to her heart, hidden behind a meaningless smile. In many ways Noone respected her for this, he hoped that her ability would rub off on him.
“You are quite strong Noone. But you really shouldn’t have been so aggressive.” Raelith’s flowery voice drifted only to his ears. Noone merely chuckled, looking her in the eyes to see how serious she was. Eventually he sighed.
“Perhaps. But what’s done is done.” He shrugged awkwardly. He glanced towards the cart, and Sally. “Sometimes certain outcomes are unavoidable. It is only a matter of when.” A playful smile was on his lips. Raelith nodded but said nothing.
In truth Raelith wasn’t very happy with Sally’s behavior. However, Raelith and Sally had never been friends back in the Burian. They were very different people. Raelith knew that she would have to hold her tongue to work with her.
She was old enough that small scuffles like this weren’t even worth noticing anymore. She saw it as the minor drama of the human emotion. This was why she was able to remain so aloft.
“By the way, I like your clothes.” Raelith gave Noone a knowing smile. He couldn’t help but grin back.
“Thank you. These are with the style of my home. I picked them up earlier from Mr. Rynt.”
Sarah walked into the courtyard with the young teary-eyed girl following along closely. Yisanet wanted to be there to the very last moment.
Sarah and Sally made eye contact for a moment but neither said anything.
Jakobson stood off to the side and Sarah quietly approached him.
“Jakobson, I was wondering if I could take this book with me.” Sarah handed over a book which had been resting in her room ever since before she left for their trip to the edge of the world. If Feylin had been there to see it, he would recognize the small book as the guide Sarah and he had initially used to look up what the Burian was a year ago.
Jakobson looked down at the leather-bound cover and flipped through the book silently. For some reason he had no recollection of a book like this within their library.
The writing was incredibly small and immaculate. Inside there was an immense amount of information about the various geography’s and political affiliations of the common world. There was something about everything - from the Northern Tip to the Southern Ocean - and even some information about the eastern continent. Jakobson’s eyebrows rose as he continued to flip through it.
“Amazing.” He thought. “I don’t know how this ended up in our library but there’s some serious work put into this.” Jakobson closed the book and then opened the front cover. After scanning the page he found an incredibly small signature in the bottom corner of the page. “Eephie? Never heard of them."
He quietly handed the book back to Sarah and gave her a single nod. This was the least he could do, and it would serve her much better than him now.
She was quick to put it safely into her pack. She had realized since the first moment she found the book how valuable it was. Sarah had been extremely unsure if he would let her hold onto it, however she didn’t want to steal it from the temple either.
Finally, Feylin walked into the courtyard. He looked much better than he did before, but there was a tenseness to his movements. He made eye contact with Sarah and did his best to give her a reassuring smile, however it came off slightly stiff.
Tobias watched the courtyard like a hawk, not missing a single action. He frowned but knew there was nothing he could do about it right now. He glanced at Sally. After talking with her he trusted that she wouldn’t cause any more trouble, however he still had to deal with the tension she already created.
Ultimately it didn’t matter what Sarah chose to do, as long as it did not affect their ability to work as a unit and no one tried to disrupt the hierarchy.
Tobias’s opinion of Sarah had not changed, and after thinking about Jakobson’s choice, he couldn’t help but feel that it may have been the right one. Even Tobias had not always been a part of the Order of Life.
Sally summoned a horse and silently attached it to the cart. Conversation began to die down and everyone knew that soon they would be leaving.
Feylin and Sarah couldn’t help but look around at the temple courtyard, trying to burn the image of it into their minds.
Like a family being forced apart, they gave Jakobson their last goodbye’s. Jakobson, in a moment of weakness, hugged both of them.
“You both need to take care of each other. No. Matter. What. When you manage to come back, I want you to be just as close as you were when you left.” He whispered into both of their ears.
They looked at each other. Eventually they nodded. Jakobson had basically raised them both, what else could they do? A smile broke through the tenseness in their bodies. When Jakobson saw this, he was finally able to breathe a sigh of relief.
“Alright,” Tobias’s voice brought them back into the moment. “It’s time to go. We have a month’s journey to the next town, so it won’t be so bad from here on out.”
Everyone nodded, stepping to their place around the cart.
The temple watched on silently as the party of six left through the front gates.
The sun was halfway between the peak of the sky and the horizon, they had three or four hours of daylight left.