"Did the potion give me a skill?" Seliana asked then swallowed audibly, throwing a glance towards Tercius and Penelope. The woman had to wet her lips a few times while she seemed to mull over something. "Penelope, do you remember what I told you about that skill?"
"That one?" Penelope asked gently, sharing a raised eyebrow with Seliana.
"Yes, that one. The same applies here. No talking about it. At all. With anyone," Seliana said and then had to drink some melted snow, her throat dry as she thought about what she was about to say. She turned to his uncle. "Lux, is the boy really as reliable as he seems?"
His uncle considered Tercius with a stern look on his face. "If you mean to ask if he can keep a secret, then yes. He knows how to keep his mouth shut,"
"Well then… Tercius, what you hear now is a secret, so keep it to yourself," the woman had to take a breath. "In Tripatis, I don’t know what happened with that potion, or how this happened, but when I woke up, I did not have any new skills. Yet…"
Seliana took another sip from the cup. "Well… the day we came to Lissea, in that inn, you were all downstairs having dinner when I felt this… heat in my chest, right around here," she said and placed a hand over her heart. "And thinking that… well, I was thinking that my time had come once more. I laid on that bed there, and I don't know how much time passed, but the feeling just got worse. Much worse. I thought my insides were melting,"
In the minds of the listeners of Seliana’s tale, they finally received the reason for her strange behavior that evening. When they found her, the woman had tears in her eyes and wore the only dress she brought with her.
"Then out of nowhere I received this skill, and the heat stopped as if a heavy blanket was lifted off of me," she said and told them word for word the description of her new skill.
Heart of Mending (1)
At the expense of a small amount of your Mana regeneration rate, your heart moderately increases the rate at which your body heals. Every skill level increases the effect by a small degree and lowers the cost of its use by a small degree.
"And ever since, I was just… looking for a way to tell you this," Seliana said looking straight at Lux. "This… this changes a few things,"
"That it does," Lux exhaled, throwing a glance at Tercius. Once a brief momentary surprise lapsed, Tercius even found the whole thing… highly probable. In retrospect, he should have seen this coming.
There existed some mechanism of gaining new skills that eluded him even after all this time. For example, many of his skills were not the those he actively sought after. Tercius just got them and picked them up because they seemed useful. Precision and Teaching to just name two. Others he wanted and actively tried to get, but they would not show up. From the name of this skill, and keeping in mind what his uncle told him about the surgery, and the heart failure, he saw a link from which the skill emerged.
And what a skill it was.
At face value, the skill was a constant all-purpose heal. On level 1 the skill might not look like much, but at 40? 60? 80? The thought of having a skill like that was enough for Tercius to have an open heart surgery right now. He would expose his own heart if need be.
Tercius desire to solve his skill acquisition problem suddenly intensified, if only to try to gain the same skill as Seliana did.
Having a thought, he flashed Mana Sight and using Visualization looked at the image, his eyes just captured, more closely. Finding an image of Seliana's Mana outline, the day before Lissea, was comically easy. By placing the two next to each other, he made a brief cross-examination, searching for differences. The amount of Mana Seliana had inside of her seemed much the same, but small gains were not perceptible with his senses anyway. To make a visible comparison, he had to examine two images that were taken over a longer period of time. For now, he could barely register the difference of three months of growth, and that was only for children. For older folks, like his grandfather for example, a year was the minimum required. Only then was the difference in Mana quantity plainly visible.
As Tercius looked at the Mana outline, around Seliana’s chest area, on the image he just took, he noticed a small, yet valuable, detail. One which left his insides feeling giddy. Barely visible from the surrounding Mana, near the center of Seliana’s chest, her heart now housed a tiny star of its own. It was barely perceptible and easily dismissed. But if you knew where to search for it, had the right tools for the work, and looked hard enough, then you could find it.
Making a small note to examine his skill Stone Shaping while in use, with Mana Sight, he returned to the present and rejoined the ongoing conversation as an active listener.
"....should go as soon as possible," Tercius only heard the tail end of the conversation.
"What?" he dumbly asked.
"I said you two will go to the Academy as soon as possible. There is no time to waste, you heard the little birdie there yourself, there will soon be others that come for Seliana," Lux repeated.
Penelope did not say a word, yet from her fidgety body language and the concerned expression plastered over her face, Tercius saw that she was only worried for Seliana.
"Seliana, when the kids leave, I will escort you as far north as I am allowed to go, then… I am hesitant to hire mercenaries, a single word might ruin your hiding place," Lux said. "But we will figure something out when the kids leave. Penelope, do not worry for your mother, she will be alright,"
"All right," Seliana said as she sent a small smile to her daughter. "Then we pack up and leave for the city,"
And so they did. All of them traveled light, with a mere backpack of things to carry on their shoulders. Tercius had Amber, Penelope had Draco, and the unnamed bird that started regaining his green plumage. Both of the pets were in small cages, which Penelope covered with fur to protect the small animals inside from cold, and then personally carried.
Tercius had an idea of interrogating the mage for some information on his skills, but Lux turned that down.
"You are going to an academy, and not just any academy. The Academy. Patience, you will learn it in good time. As they say, drink from the source. Do not taint your palate with something he could say," Lux said.
But before they left, Lux had another task for Tercius. Extending a dagger Tercius’ way, Lux had on his mind another lesson to teach his nephew.
"Take it. There is one more task to be done before we leave,"
Tercius knew what his uncle meant, and he tried to make a plea, but his uncle had none of it.
"Listen Tercius. His life is yours, just like the life of the other one was mine. They chose their path, now it’s time for them to reap what they sowed,"
***
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Lux, Seliana, Penelope, and Tercius stood in a rough semicircle around the prone mage. Some five meters back a body was dumped into the pure white snow. They were inside the woods, a kilometer north of the cabin, where Lux took them to finish, as Lux called it, one more task.
Looking at the unconscious man, whose body sank just a bit into the snow, and then glancing at the dagger he held in his hand, Tercius knew what was asked of him to do.
Yet indecision gripped his gut.
To kill or…what?
He knew what the man came here to do, what his intentions were.
Was he angry? Furious.
There were any number of things that could have gone wrong, and someone he knew and cared about could have been killed.
Did he want revenge for it? Yes.
He wanted for the young mage to pay for what he did. And for what? For mere money. There were no courts of justice in the Empire, just some specialized Peacekeepers who had some kind of skill to detect lies. Then they carried out justice with a few preset guidelines. But in this case that could not be applied, if they tried that the mage would be set free, while Seliana…
And finally, did he want to kill the man? …No.
Not even that furious piece of him wanted that. Not even the vengeful one wanted that. In a past life, he was raised with belief that life was a gift that no one had the right of robbing. Even those who did kill another should not in turn be killed. But that was such a black and white view that his previous society enabled and enforced. Tercius knew where he lived now. What kind of laws applied here, or rather, did not apply.
His mind knew it.
Was it the fear of sullying his hands and soul? He heard that term at some point in his past life, and right now it floated at the forefront of his mind, tolling in his head, while he hesitated.
But no, it was not even that.
It was that this first time would open a door. A door he was not sure he wanted even touched, because he was not sure what stood at the other side.
As Tercius spent minutes standing still and gazing without blinking at the paralyzed mage, Lux, Seliana, and especially Penelope, in turn, looked at him.
Lux's nephew stood like a statue over the prone mage ever since they dragged him here. With a dagger in hand, the boy would at times gaze at the edge and then back down at the mage. Lux had to wonder if he was doing the right thing. He himself did not kill another human being before he was 13, an age where he was almost a man in his own right. Now he was forcing his 11-year-old nephew to do it. Yet his gut told him that the boy needed it. Tercius was this strange mix of a childish man and a mature child.
A personality mix he never met before.
The boy’s abilities would see him soar high, and some things were better taught sooner rather than later. Later might be, as the self-explanatory word said, late. Under his eye, while he was still with his nephew, he could throw his nephew into the pool, allow him to get wet, then drag him out once the boy started drowning.
Seliana also watched in silence, thinking along the same edges. This lesson was hard, but necessary. Both for Tercius, and her own daughter. She glanced Penelope's way and her daughter looked ready to protest what they were making Tercius do. It took a considerable amount of time for Seliana and Lux to convince the boy to do it, so the girl’s intentions would ruin what they painstakingly achieved. Seliana mastered herself, then mustering all of her reproach, with just a glare, she informed the girl to be quiet.
This is not your lesson, her eyes told Penelope, but if you are smart you will learn even from a lesson intended for another.
Deciding to help the boy, Seliana came near him, giving him a small smile, she took the dagger from his hand. "You can turn around, I will do it. He owes me a debt too. For what he and his have tried to do to me, for how they hurt my daughter. He tried to kill you, and you are the one who brought him down, so you have precedence. But if you won't do it... I will," she said, pointing the dagger at the mage.
She knew that Lux was observing her small push, but everyone needed a nudge, now and again. Something to put the whole thing into perspective, in a smaller amount of time. Seliana had to learn these tough lessons on her own skin, and even though she wanted with every fiber of her being to spare these children of the sight, Seliana knew that she would be doing them a disservice if she did.
Seliana did not like what she and Lux were doing to the boy or to her daughter, but it was necessary. It might save their life one day if instead of hesitating, they struck first. Even if the boy ended up not doing it, she would force both of them to watch when she slit the throat of the mage.
As she expected, the boy took back the dagger, sending a small sad smile her way.
"Are you sure? I will do it if you can’t," she said to the boy. The boy looked at the dagger in his hand, and merely nodded.
Turning back she saw Lux sending a grateful nod her way.
"Do you want me to wake him up?" Lux asked as he glanced at the prone man. The mage was probably frozen stiff, laying in the snow with no cloak on, just one thin shirt to provide cover. They even took the man’s boots, as they proved to be of a newer and better make than the ones Lux wore. Quite comfortable too, with a fur lining on the inside.
"No," Tercius said with a firm voice, shaking his head at his uncle's words. "Let him sleep in oblivion. There’s no need to torture him,"
Taking a step forward, his foot sank into the untainted snow. When he took another step, Tercius observed how much of an impact his foot left, from so much snow, not only a few centimeters were left. All of the trapped air and free space was forced out, compacting the light snow into something more resembling ice.
Three steps brought Tercius right above the man's head.
A single bend of the knees brought him even closer.
After what Seliana revealed to them, Tercius knew that this man would not see another dawn rise. By his, or another's hand, this man would be dead. There was no doubt about that. With his eyes wide open, Tercius exhaled.
From this distance he saw the man's eyebrows in detail, each and every follicle, he saw how the man had a small bump on his nose, from where his uncle smashed his nose. Tercius saw where the man cut himself on the neck when he shaved, the wound maybe a day or two old. A split lip from when Seliana vented her frustrations. This unconscious man had a mother and a father, probably a sibling or two. Maybe a lover. He was also a man in the employment of a person chasing after Seliana.
All of these things made the man who laid in front of him.
With a single fast slash across the mage’s neck, Tercius unmade him.
The wound was of considerable depth and width, Tercius’s way of making sure he would not have to do a second slash. The sharp blade felt heavy in his hand, so he let it drop. He watched through misty eyes as the blood flowed out of the wound, wondering if someone would grieve when Haem, a son, a man, a mage, failed to return home. Would they mourn after a man possibly dead or cling to hope that he lived somewhere far away?
His lungs struggled for air, as a pressure rose in his ears. He heard his heartbeat, as the smell of fresh blood reached his nostrils. The warm blood melted the snow tainting it a rich crimson.
Rising pressure from his gut promised a swift surprise. Turning his head sideways, Tercius emptied the contents of his stomach, everything from this morning's breakfast, still unprocessed and in pieces, to something he only recognized by color as those greens he had yesterday for lunch.
In his throat and nose, the stomach acid ate at the tissue walls, forcing an even bigger gag. An empty one this time.
What little he had in him, he ejected on the left side of the dead mage.
On the right, the blood stopped coming out in large amounts, now merely leaking as the heart still pumped, not aware of its impending end.
As Tercius forced himself to observe the sight he made, in his eyes the dead mage or better yet the man Tercius killed, looked like an angel. With Haem in the middle, a wing on the right made of the man’s lifeblood, and the one on the left a wing made of stomach acid and food in different stages of gestation, greenish yellow in color.
"The wild beasts will sort out the cleaning," Seliana said and pulled the trembling Penelope close. "And we should move now, the blood will attract them."
Lux followed Seliana’s suit and took his kneeling nephew by his shoulders, pulling him upwards, then steering him from accidentally stepping into the watery blood, made of melted snow and a fresh kill.
All the while Tercius shivered.
***
In silence, they walked towards the city, as Lux scouted a bit ahead. Tercius thought that he was in some kind of a daze. Everything somehow seemed a bit distant, as if what happened back there, happened to someone else. But his nose still smelled the blood, his eyes still saw the scene, his hand still remembered the resistance the mage's neck had, as the dagger slashed that neck from one end to the other.
His feet mechanically moved after Seliana, occasionally stumbling over an unseen stone, or tripping as a leg tripped on a snow-covered hole.
The backpack kept him pinned to earth physically, while Amber did the same mentally. Awake and feeling the need to cuddle she squirmed in his arms, as he carried her. He remembered his uncle's behavior as he led Tercius away from that spot, the nonchalance as Lux joked that they should have asked the mage where he bought the comfortable boots before they had disposed of him. Then Seliana giving a small laugh at the joke.
It all seemed so… normal. It all felt the same. And that fact unnerved him. So he stayed in a daze. Intentionally or not... it did not matter. Not now. Not as long as it staved off the reality of his actions. He could argue that he was persuaded into it, but he knew that if he did not allow it, then there was no way anyone could have made him do it. Tercius did it with his own will. With his own hand.
That was supposed to be difficult. he thought.
In front of his eyes flashed memories of one day, years ago, when he saw a brutal death for the first time. The victims cries for help, the eagle’s cry of a hunt well done. The blood spray as the eagle soared way up high. He had seen blood even before that, both his and others. He knew the smell of it. The mage’s blood was no different in any way other that what it represented for him.
No one other than Penelope seemed to care about the mage's death and the fact that he died by his hand. And even she did not seem as phased by it as he expected that she would be.
Right now, as they marched to the city, another thought brought its weight on him. As soon as the next day dawns, he and Penelope would be going to the Library to join this clue hunt, and by the time they finished it, the time to part with Lux would arrive. It suddenly felt too soon.
The older man would make sure Seliana stayed safe, probably change her general look, and name, and then find her a place to stay. Then Lux would be on his way towards the Capital, to see his family. Maybe this infamous grandfather of his died in the meantime, maybe he recuperated. Who knows what happened to his paternal grandmother. Gods know what happened to the still nameless five older brothers of his father. Lux rarely talked of his family, a few mentions here and there along the way.
The city walls and the city behind them were starting to come into view as they moved forward, and Tercius saw his uncle was waiting for them at the side of the snow-covered road.
"What took you so long? My legs are freezing, let us hurry a bit." Lux said, his hooded head nodding towards Lissea.