The low hum of the Ether powered elevator barely registered in Sett’s ears. He always felt claustrophobic in such a small space, barely 20 square feet, and the dull gray of the walls didn’t do much to make it better. He usually chose to go up the stairs but his body begged for rest today. He didn’t have to stay boxed up for long though, as he stepped out onto the eighth floor.

He looked down from the parapet along the hallway, facing the courtyard in the centre. It was dark and too cloudy for the light of stars to penetrate too deeply, so Sett could barely make out the outlines of the trees. The height of the building was comforting, bringing him closer to the sky, and further away from the convolutions of the ground. He turned left and walked towards his family’s apartment, tracing his hand across the parapet, finding comfort in the polished stone.

He pushed the door open and walked in, knowing it would be open if someone was home, as is usually the case this late. Even if his father was out, his brother Mitt would be home, though Sett wished his recluse sibling would pull out of this angsty phase and go back to playing outside like he used to.

He walked into the living room ahead of him. It had fiery red futons arranged around the floor in the typical furnishing of the region, bright yellow and orange bolster pillows and cushions spread across them. The bright hues clashed harshly against the turquoise walls. His mother’s abysmal taste in colors and her manic obsession with reds shone through, and neither Sett nor his father had the heart to replace that piece of her. There were a couple of newsletters and a book strewn across, most likely his father catching up on weather and farming developments across the planet. Sett peeked at the book, and cringed a little when he saw it was self-improvement quackery by some famous charlatan in Krakar II. He never understood his father’s interest in such collections of obvious advice dressed up as wisdom.

“Sett? Is that you?”

Sett turned right, facing the kitchen where his father was cutting up some vegetables, a rakeseed broth boiled on the heating plate next to him. Sett could smell the slightly sour aroma of bread, probably still in the oven. His father had his back faced to him, haphazardly splitting a carrot like it was freshly killed game.

“Yeah dad”

“You’re late. Everything okay?”

“Yeah I got held up at Laira’s. I went to drop off her commission”

“That was today? You’re done with it? Congrats kid, damn. Your first ever commission. Your mother would be proud.”

Sapp Keidum turned around to face his son, beaming while holding a knife. His choppy brown hair, which he insisted he cut himself, was messier than usual today. Sett assumed he had fallen asleep in the living room before rushing into the kitchen when he woke up. He was wearing an old, grey full length tunic, loose and easy for domestic clothing. His amber eyes shone with pride at his son, the very same eyes that enchanted Saecca the first time they’d met. Sett met his gaze with his own amber pair, wearily smiling. Sapp stared at him for a few moments more, his expression becoming pensive.

“Yeah, Laira said the same thing. I’ve been thinking of her.”

His father sighed. “Of course you have. Laira brings her up every time I see her, I bet she had a talk with you about Saecca today.”

Sett nodded silently and his father continued, “Anyway, let's celebrate. There’s a bottle of whiskey lying around, and I’ll get some nice meat from Jon tomorrow. I’m sorry, I forgot the date else I’d have cooked something nicer. And baked a cake. I’ll do that tomorrow.” Sapp rambled on, fumbling through the kitchen cabinets for the bottle.

“Don’t worry about it. I almost forgot myself today, I barely managed to polish them off on time”

His father chuckled as he fished the bottle out from deep in a cabinet, “Go take a bath, you look grimy. I’ll finish off the broth in the meantime.”

Sett turned around, heading to his room behind him. He paused for a second outside Mitt’s room, but moved on, opening the next door to his own. He gazed at his bed to the left of the entrance, a stone berth extending out of the wall furnished with a cushiony mattress covered by a lanose violet blanket. To Sett’s tired eyes, it looked like 22 square feet of paradise. He hypnotically walked towards the bed, halfway passed out already, but snapped himself alert and turned to his cupboard. He grabbed a towel and a purple tunic, rushing out of his room to the bathroom at the end of the hallway.

Sett spent a pleasantly long time in the bath, partially dozing off until the warm water cooled to match his body temperature, and finally emerged from his immersion cleaner than ever. His father was lounging in the living room with his book and his brother was probably still in his room.

“Nothing like a cold broth after a long day of work right?”

“Sorry, the bath just felt too good. You should’ve eaten before me”

“Nah, I wanted to eat with you. Especially today.”

Sett smiled slightly at his father’s words, moving towards Mitt’s room to call him for dinner.

“He crawled out of his hibernation while you were bathing and took his dinner inside. I doubt he’d join us now,” his father explained emptily. Sett sighed and filled two bowls with broth, dumping a few rolls of bread in them, and joined his father in the futon. Sapp pulled out a glass bottle with an amber liquid, partially filling up two glasses.

“To your first commission of many more,” he declared, raising a glass. Sett raised his too, and downed the whiskey in one graceful motion. He grimaced for a moment as the fiery drink passed his throat, welcoming the modest lightheadedness. His father proceeded to do the same, and filled up the glasses again.

The duo devoured the now lukewarm broth in silence. Sett was famished, and so was his father apparently.

“The Throh kids have their onset next week,” Sett informed his father after his hunger had calmed a little.

“Ugh, is that brat still set on the Corps?”

“Yeah I doubt he’s changing his mind. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him plan this much for anything”

“I hope there’s no more peacekeeping missions then.” Sapp spat the word out with disgust.

“It’s probably best to keep him away from uncle Tecc too.”

Seeing his father’s displeased expression, he added, “Bone’s looking into nature mage apprenticeships. He’ll probably be great for Mupnal if it works out.”

“Yeah, shit, we can grow actual Ether flora if we had one. Maybe some weird variety of rakeseed that heals you if you turn it into whiskey,” Sapp laughed.

Ether flora are plants that grew in areas with strong Ether concentrations over hundreds of years, or were artificially cultivated by mages. They could do anything from miraculously heal wounds to increase stats, and were incredibly rare. Even an F grade Ether plant would fetch thousands of Coins in their planet, even more if an alchemist processed it into a potent potion or pill. They didn’t grow naturally in Resource III, and even on Krakar I all the naturally occurring flora had been long harvested.

“Saecca had come across an Ether flower once,” Sapp mentioned. Sett had heard the story from his mother, and his father knew that, but it was clear Sapp wanted to steer the conversation to her, however awkward his attempt was.

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“Yeah, she told me. In Ambaar Commune near the Rili Sea.” Sett’s mother had gone there as a child with her family for vacation, as the beaches of Ambaar were famous even on the main planets. She had snuck out of the inn they were staying in at night and found a water mage in the outskirts of the commune cultivating it.

“Hmm, yeah. It was a water affinity flower that could absorb a little water that went into the person that ate it for a few minutes. A skilled alchemist could turn it into a pill that could let you breathe underwater. Temporarily of course.”

“She didn’t tell me that. She only said that it was the most beautiful flower she’d ever seen.”

Saecca had described it to Sett as an iridescent aquamarine blue, shimmering in the starlight. She had watched the mage inundating the flower with Ether, gently urging it to grow. She had been spotted and the kind lady had explained what the flower was to her.

“It was. She told me about it when I was courting her. We snuck out to the woods to, um, walk.” His father blushed a little. “She talked a lot about the flower, how she felt it tempered her intensity a little, calmed her restlessness when she stared.” Sapp’s eyes focused on his memory of his wife, gazing into the distance behind Sett.

“The very next week, I stole some Coins from my dad, left a note at home, and took an Ether Train to Ambaar. It took me nearly a day on the train to get there, and I could barely afford a rundown shithole to stay in.”

“To see the flower?”

“To steal it,” Sapp laughed. Sett giggled a little too, imagining his father breaking into a mage’s residence with all the confidence of a fool in love.

“It wasn’t there though. I searched the whole day and eventually found the house. Apparently the flower matured a year ago, and the mage harvested it and left the planet.” Sapp paused to take a sip of whiskey. “Your grandparents were furious when I got back,” he roared with laughter. Sett couldn’t imagine kind, old grandpa Sinn being even slightly annoyed about anything.

“It was worth it though, seeing your mother’s laugh when she heard about it. She called me a dumbass and laughed for months, and just for that I’d have done it all again.” Sapp’s laughter transformed into a sad smile, and Sett imagined his own expression would be similarly somber. His mother’s laughter was wild, fiery and infectious. Sett felt a smile coming on even as he imagined it. What he’d give to hear it again.

His father snuck his hand under a cushion and pulled out a sheathed knife. He gave it to Sett who yanked it out of the sheathe. It had a beautiful and well-crafted handle, slightly curving at the end, whose whitish brown wood Sett couldn’t identify. There was a tassel made of the white fur of a Rainat hanging from the handle. He ran his hands across the blade, taking in the fine craftsmanship, better than anything even Thane could make. It was about 7 inches long, with a serrated segment in the middle and a slight curve at the end, perfect for a hunting knife. It glimmered in the glowstone light, the steel containing a tinge of amber. There was only one metal Sett knew that gave off that color - Thir steel, one of the rarer metals mined in Resource II. Thir steel was blazingly red, Sett assumed this blade was an alloy containing a small amount of the robust metal. The sheathe was made of the dark brown leather of some reptile, perfectly seamed at the edge. He knew something this well crafted wouldn’t come from anywhere but the best smiths in Central City, if it was even made on this planet. Sett had an inkling of who it belonged to.

“It was your mother’s. She bought it from Central City when she went there with Laira during her apprenticeship. I don’t think it was crafted there though”

“It looks expensive. What wood is that?” Sett asked, not taking his eyes off the knife.

“Ironwood from the Khaw Desert. She had some savings, but Laira covered most of the cost”

Sett continued to examine the knife, twirling it around his left hand as his father continued after a pause.

“I added the tassel at the end. Do you remember? We hunted down a Rainat after she died.”

Sett did remember. He remembered the sorrow he felt when he heard the news, freshly home from school. He remembered the initial shock, the denial.

He remembered the rage.

“Yeah. Is it from that Rainat?” He gripped the knife tighter, but quickly suppressed his rising emotions.

“Yeah. I took some fur after we killed it.”

Sett resheated the blade and handed it back to his father, but Sapp shook his head.

“I want you to have it. I used it for a few hunting trips but I think it’s better off with you. At least, it might help with your blacksmithing or something. It’s well crafted”

Sett stared at the knife for a moment as he held it. It felt heavy, weightier than the materials that went into it. ”Thank you,” he said sincerely.

Father and son stared at each other for a few moments, wordlessly sharing their sense of loss with each other. Sapp broke the silence first.

“You need to replace it though. I can’t hunt anymore until you make me a new one,” he joked awkwardly, clearly not one for silent moments.

“Of course. Not yet though, I’ll make one as good as this. I need some time to improve.” Sapp smiled in reply.

Sett felt the absence of one more person in this solemn family bonding evening, and he quickly got up to drag his recluse brother out of his room, leaving the knife on a cushion. He knocked on his brother’s door, and knocked again after hearing no reply.

“Oi! Come have dinner!”

“I’ve eaten already. Go away,” a voice came from the inside.

“Come sit with us then”

“Why?”

“Because”

“Because what?”

“Just because man, open the door!”

Sett could hear reluctant footsteps approaching the door, and it slowly creaked open.

“Why are you being so loud?”, an annoyed head poked out of the room. Before he could react, Sett quickly grabbed the head and held his brother in a chokehold. The teen’s desperate struggle was no match for Sett’s muscles honed from forging steel, though he was annoyed by the hardback book smacking against his face.

He dragged the writhing boy to the living room and threw him on the futon, their father watching on with amusement.

“What’s your problem aba?!” Mitt shouted from the ground. Sett grinned down at him in response and sat down, blocking another swing of the book.

“Calm down Mitt. Sit with us. What are you reading?”

Mitt eventually did calm down as he adjusted himself to a sitting position, and sighed.

“Trent and the founding of the Teh’ner plains,” he answered listlessly.

Sett knew the book, though he hadn’t read it himself. It was about Trent, the explorer who discovered the Teh’ner Plains back when Resource III had just begun being ventured into. Rumours were that he was related to the Krakarian dynasty, but renounced his surname and went just by Trent. The book was a famous retelling of his adventures on the planet, based on his diary.

“There’s no point reading about the history of the plains if you don’t leave your room and actually look around, you know.”

“I know the plains better than you, I actually work on the farm instead of being cooped up in a smithy”

“Big deal, I’ve worked on the farm too and I’ve explored beyond that.”

Mitt stuck his tongue out, but didn’t argue further.

“The Throh brothers have their Onset in a week,” Sett brought the topic up again, knowing full well his brother knew. Sett even suspected that his brother didn’t go out these days because he couldn’t stand listening to them talk about the system without him. Mitt had another year to go before he could access his stats and begin apprenticeships, and he had been quite close to the Throhs. The younger Keidum hated the feeling of being left out of conversations, and he was probably also avoiding dealing with the twins leaving Mupnal for their own future plans.

“Yeah, so?”

“Have you talked to them about it?”

“Why should I? They don’t need my help”

“I don’t know, could be fun. You don’t have yours for another year, but it’d still be fun to know.”

“I don’t care,” Mitt said, clearly annoyed, and got up again to leave when he noticed the knife.

“What’s that?” he asked, picking it up.

“It’s your mother’s old hunting knife. I’m giving it to Sett because he finished his first commission today.”

Sett could see emotion welling up in his brother’s face at the mention of their mother. He was only 7 when she died, but the loss was still heavy.

Mitt, latest in a family tradition of avoiding emotional moments, kept the knife down after examining it and turned to his door. Sett could glimpse the tears in his brother’s eyes, so he let him go without comment.

Sett trudged into his room after helping his father clean the dishes. His body was exhausted, and his mind was overwhelmed with emotion. He looked at the knife in his hand for a moment, and kept it under his pillow. He collapsed onto his bed, passing out immediately.