Amy stood there silently for a long moment. Sophia gave her the time she needed to recover from her surprise.
Amy shook herself. She almost looked like a dog shaking water out of her fur for a moment. “The Maze is … well, it’s a maze. It’s supposed to lead to the Gateways to Midgard and Jotunheim and probably other places, but no one’s been able to find the way since the Broken Lord broke the pathways. The monsters are too dangerous; if you go more than a little ways in, you find monsters more suited to Patrons than to anyone left in the Broken Lands. It’s a deathtrap, but it’s also the only real place to gather Wisps in the Broken Lands for anyone past Level Ten. It’s supposed to be slow, but slow is still faster than taking years to gain a new Ability.”
If no one could get through the Maze, it explained why Amy wanted a way to travel that wasn’t the Maze. “Sounds like something we should look into when we’re strong enough. Maybe there are Gateways there that lead home.” Sophia doubted it, but she didn’t have any better clues. If she could establish two-way travel, she could come back and explore more later.
At least, she could if she didn’t lose whatever she gained from the Guide. She’d lost her skills from the Voice when she crossed universes.
No, surely that wouldn’t happen again if she used a Gateway. That sounded like something deliberately constructed; the Guide was probably on both sides. There probably wasn’t a way home there. It was still worth a look. She missed her family, a bit, even if she already knew she’d want to come back and explore more after a visit home. More importantly, Dav’s parents sounded like they needed help.
“No one can get through the Maze. No one’s even tried in years.” Amy sounded disappointed. “I hoped you’d have another way. If I could bring that home, no one would mind that I only show one side of the family.” She sighed heavily. “Too good to be true. Still, you two are welcome to come when I head home. Everyone will want to hear tales of another place, even if you don’t know how to get there, and you’re strong enough to get some respect.”
That wasn’t the best invitation Sophia had ever heard. Fortunately, it was one she didn’t have to worry about right now. “Dav? How are you holding up?”
“Ehh, could be better. My leg’s better, still aches a bit but I should be able to walk far enough to let it heal while we deal with the next fire. The armor’s closed up as well; I can still see where the damage was, but it’s trying to repair itself. I guess it’s good to know that it doesn’t work fast enough to help in a particular fight.” Dav paused for a moment.
“Self-repair’s a good enchantment,” Amy agreed. “There are ways to help it along, but they’re not really necessary for damage like that. I can show you what I mean tonight, if it’s not done by then?”
Sophia was pretty sure Self-Repair wasn’t on Dav’s Status for his armor the last time she saw it. She frowned in thought.
Wait, that was before the “synchronization” finished after he gained a Level, wasn’t it? She remembered talking to him about it and how armor-related Abilities were cheaper, but not about any changes to the way his Status displayed his armor information.
Yeah, that made sense. He probably hadn’t realized she didn’t know and she’d forgotten to ask. Neither of them pulled up their Status screens all that often; there wasn’t much reason to, outside of checking Shield levels and Dedicating Wisps.
“I’ll take you up on that,” Dan answered absently. “I’m at thirteen … no, fourteen Shield. Why did it just go up?”
Shield did increase with rest, but it took hours, not minutes. They’d never managed to catch it when it happened before. Neither Sophia nor Dav was that interested in staring at their Status just to see the number change.
“You’re sure your Healing Beacon doesn’t have any ability to bolster Shield?” Amy waved at Dav. “I’ve never seen you sit on it before, maybe you had to be closer?”
Dav shook his head. “No, I’m sure it doesn’t. It interacts with the body, not with whatever makes Shield. I know that, the same way I can choose which it affects and who it doesn’t.”
Sophia frowned at Dav for a moment, then smiled at the only person who hadn’t spoken. The chinchilla shared a name with one of the bandits who stranded Dav and her in the Broken Lands, but he didn’t seem at all like the man. If he had some sort of shield recovery Ability like Lady Essia, that was even less like the original Taika. “Are you doing it Taika?”
“Uh, maybe?” Taika didn’t sound confident at all. “I don’t really know what I can do except illusions.”
“What does your Status say?” Amy sounded like she thought she was asking an obvious question of someone who just wasn’t thinking.
A screen appeared in front of Sophia. She wrinkled her nose in confusion. It was clearly a sort of a limited Status screen, but it was very different from her own. It only had Taika’s name and the designation Comfort Animal, but there was an oddly colorful star that bounced in the parenthesis after Comfort Animal.
The star’s movement was oddly soothing as it slowly rose and fell inside the parenthesis.
Taika Status? [https://i.imgur.com/N8owY4d.png]
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
“It’s different.” Taika sounded confused. “The word Sphere is gone and there’s a strange shape after the words Comfort Animal.”
“I’ve never seen that before, but I think I’ve heard of it.” Amy’s frown contrasted with the wonder in her voice. “The bouncing star, I mean. It means you’ve used an ability that has different directions it can go and picked one. I’ve never heard of that happening to a Sphere. If you concentrate on the star, it should let you know what your remaining choices are.”
Taika grumbled deep in his throat. He didn’t sound happy.
Sophia recognized the look. It was just like the way Dav looked when he was examining his Status for possible Abilities to gain by Dedicating Wisps. Sophia was sure she looked the same, as well.
“I think it is Taika,” Dav said after a while. “My Shield just went up another point.”
“I found what I lost,” Taika said on the heels of Dav’s conclusion. “If you can call that lost. I’d rather be a Beast than a Monster. I can’t take a Sphere of my own.” Taika gave a heavy sigh. “I had to choose that before I could choose anything else. I’ve probably been able to see the rest for days and just didn’t realize it. I make people feel better. That’s what I do. I think it includes helping recover Shield.”
Sophia could tell there was more Taika didn’t say, but his body language said that he felt sad and defensive, not deceptive. She was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, for now.
“I just gained Comfort Animal as a known Beast,” Cliff’s mental voice whispered joyfully in the back of Sophia’s mind. “I didn’t even know I could learn Beasts, or what a Beast is! They’re smart animals that range from barely smarter than a natural animal to … huh, there is no upper end. There’s no way to tell a Beast from someone with a full Status other than the limited Status. It does make the Monster category clearer, Monsters have a natural drive to attack people that Beasts don’t have. They get something from killing people they don’t get from killing Beasts.”
Sophia blinked at the stream of excited babble. Was this the most she’d ever heard Cliff say at once?
“Monsters advance by killing and by eating concentrated sources of magic. I think that means there’s something solid at the center of a Nexus, like a Nexus Core.” Cliff’s mental voice sounded almost apologetic. “I think I may make you look especially delicious to monsters that can see me.”
Sophia focused on asking the question mentally; she could, but it was far harder than simply speaking out loud. “Does that mean you were listening to what Taika said?”
“I always listen.” Cliff’s voice was calm and didn’t sound at all sheepish. “I usually don’t care. When it means I might be eaten, I care.”
Sophia sighed. It wasn’t like she could blame him for listening when he was literally part of her body. The only person she could blame was the Guide. Sophia was pretty certain that if the Guide were present, she’d want to beat him up.
Or her. Sophia wasn’t certain which gender the Guide preferred, but it didn’t matter. Sophia was perfectly willing to beat up a woman who did what the Guide did to her.
Sophia shook her head. She didn’t want to sit any longer; she needed to move. “How’re you doing, Dav?”
Dav pushed himself to his feet. He shifted Taika from his lap to his shoulder. The chinchilla seemed to shrink a little as he settled in place. “I seem okay, now.” He paused for a moment to check his Status. “I’m at sixteen Shield, should be good enough. Let’s get moving. It’s that way, right?” He dismissed his Healing Beacon as he pointed almost in the correct direction.
“A little more to the right,” Amy corrected him. “Follow me.”
The rest of the night passed relatively uneventfully, with similar corpsevine encounters as the previous night (fortunately without a bear).
Taika was definitely smaller by morning. He fit comfortably on Dav’s shoulder, instead of having to hold himself there with his rear paws behind Dav’s back.
Feather Line Break [https://i.imgur.com/JcKTy4K.jpeg]
“I see you found the fox,” was Samuel’s greeting when they met at the archway that led back to the mansion.
“What?” Dav sounded confused. “Where?”
Samuel grinned widely and didn’t try to keep his chuckle quiet. “On your shoulder. Spirit animals are rare, and that has to be a spirit animal. So it’s the fox.”
Taika lifted his head and looked at Samuel. “What’s a spirit animal?”
Sophia noticed that he didn’t deny masquerading as a twin-tailed fox. She couldn’t say she was overly surprised; now that Samuel pointed it out, they were similarly colored and Taika was clearly a shapeshifter. She should have seen it herself.
“Beasts as strong as monsters that aren’t,” Samuel answered as if it was obvious. “No one knows much about them; you just see them sometimes in the wilderness. You know that’s what they are because they run away instead of towards you. It’s best to let them go; you never know how powerful they are. Spirit animals always have Abilities that aren’t just their own physical strength, so even the smallest can be deadly dangerous. They’re also not limited by the area they live in the same way monsters are, so you can’t predict them. I’ve never heard of one that could speak before.”
Taika didn’t answer the implied question.
“Does that mean Peaches is a spirit animal?” Dav didn’t seem to care about the fact that the miniature chinchilla on his shoulder spoke. Sophia was pretty sure they’d been whispering back and forth much of the night, so it probably wasn’t novel anymore.
Samuel shook his head. “I don’t think so. Arryn says he isn’t, and he doesn’t sound much like the legends the way a fox that becomes a mouse does.”
Sophia shot a glance at Taika. He did kind of resemble a mouse at that size, now that Samuel mentioned it. The tail was wrong and the overall shape didn’t quite seem right either, but it was a decent first guess.
“Speaking of things that aren’t where they should be,” Amy interjected, “We ran into a corpsevine-infested sabertooth cat that was definitely past the first upgrade. It had shieldbreaking teeth.” She held up the pair of teeth she’d finally separated from the big cat’s skull. “It also moved too well and wasn’t as easily distracted by fire, so I think there’s more to it than just the vines holding the skeleton together because the teeth are powerful. I think they get something from whatever they take over.”
Samuel sighed. “That would explain the corpsevine mages, wouldn’t it? You three be careful in the Challenge. Don’t push harder than you can manage, even if a spirit animal is following you around.”