“Hold this.” Morto handed over his job of applying pressure to Timbrelle’s chest wound and sat back on his heels.
They knelt at Timbrelle’s side, Adna using anxious but determined hands to Keep Morto’s impromptu compress in place. The apple-sized hole in her chest seeped blood at an alarming pace. It soaked Morto’s shirt in moments. The rest of her wounds were superficial gashes that looked to be in various stages of coagulation. The man looked much less wiry with his shirt off. What, before, had seemed like the body of a thin middle-aged man turned out to be the lean, weathered muscle of an experienced fighter. Displayed across his chest, a dozen rubies symmetrically patterned blinked in the modest light of the forest floor. The man took several steadying breaths while unsheathing a small knife made of sharpened ruby. Before she could object, he drove it into his own side.
“Morto! What the hell?” She cried, voice breaking.
He shushed her gently, closing his eyes. He guided the crimson knife around a rectangular gem with rounded edges stuck to his ribs. Blood ran freely down his side but he did not let up. Eventually Adna had to look away, disturbed at the wet noises he was making.
He held up the ruby with bloody, unsteady hands and motioned for her to remove the makeshift compress.
“Morto, you’re not going to do what I think you… oh, wow. Yes you are.” Adna narrated as he forced the newly freed gem into Timbrelle’s chest through her wound in one clean shove.
Their unconscious patient, covered in wood chips, loosed a mindless piercing scream.
“What did you do?” She asked.
“Forcible attunement.” He spat. “Disgusting stuff… but now she won’t die. Needs a soul surgeon. The other one is stable.” He nodded to the freckled woman they’d found and looked up through the new break in the canopy. “Fell from the cliff. Made the ruby take the impact. Smart… or lucky.”
Just then, Voltaire came crashing into view. He took stock of their situation quickly.“Mortominsla! Come quickly! We need to get off this mountain. I will take Ellia.” He said. His deft ministrations carefully aligned the woman’s limp form across his shoulders. “We might be able to reach Camp Winterwold in the foothills. If my bearings are to be trusted, it’s a mile southwest. My cousin should be running the seasonal training there now. He may know more about the moth we saw but I doubt it. Something appears to be starting on the mountain and it may be too early to expect the Rigel Dukedom to have anwers.”
Morto gathered up Timbrelle into a princess carry, not showing any concern for his own gaping wound, though it seemed to be bleeding much less than it had any right to. Adna tried not to look at it, but the unfortunate stray glance showed patches of white bone shining through the mess.
“Morto, will you be alright? I can take her.” Adna offered.
“Doesn’t hurt anymore.” He shrugged and jogged after Voltaire.
His general impassivity made it difficult to tell if he was lying but she got the oddest feeling that he wasn’t. Adna made a mental note to apologize to Davian. Morto was definitely terrifying. Now that she was together with Timbrelle she didn’t have the same desperation that propelled her. Morto easily drew ahead, nowhere near the rocketing pace Adna set earlier. As she lagged, she wondered just how she had managed to move so fast in the first place. Maybe she’d ask Morto if he had time to train her. He certainly couldn’t train with her, that was for sure.
She made another mental note to check her sternum when they arrived. The craterous hole in Timbrelle lined up with Adna’s pain exactly. Firm conclusions could be drawn by someone smarter but even Adna could notice the parallel.
“Up here!” Voltaire yelled from ahead. “Winterwald is downstream from this river. I estimate it will take us two hours to reach the camp.”
Adna hugged herself tightly, trying to soothe the fiery pain in her chest. It would not relent. Like a white-hot crowbar forcing her sternum apart, it throbbed.
“Could we take a break? Just for a second?”
“Is something wrong?” Voltaire seemed surprised by the delay. He then apologized. “Excuse me. Your condition actually looks quite serious.”
She touched her mouth where he looked. Her fingers came away with bright red fingertips damp with new blood. This was closely followed by a concerned look from Morto that only deepened when she coughed and sent a fine spray of blood into the dirt.
“I’ll be fine. I just need to rest for a minute.” She spat something sharp into her hand then sat there looking at it, stunned. “On second thought, I can rest when I’m dead. Let’s go.”
Voltaire looked her over warily. “Something change your mind?”
“Either Morto has been heavy handed on the vitamins and minerals in my meals, or this is a fragment of Timbrelle’s shattered aurora stone.” She held the tiny bit of red gravel up for the men to see.
“Sweet baby Jir.” Voltaire said, one eyebrow trying to escape into his hairline.
Morto frowned deeply and shook his head to himself. “Rubies shouldn’t act like that.”
“From what I gather, the rubies aren’t the mystery here. Your friend and my student…” He gestured to Timbrelle’s limp body with an elbow. “She has a multitude of secrets. Ones I doubt even she knows. Being Unmade, it’s only natural for her to keep the secrets of her people, but she told me all about ‘trains’ and ‘ping-pong’. On top of that, she promised to explain ‘protein shakes’—an Unmade potion for increasing physical strength. I’ve been trying to learn more about it for decades. I don’t believe she’s keeping any clandestine secrets, (she’s demonstrably bad at it). I think she may be someone else’s secret.”
“It really does make sense. She’s an open book. Mysteries are practically leaking out of her but she can’t keep a secret to save her life.” Adna considered the pea-sized gem fragment. “Let’s move. I can make it a mile.”
“It’ll be dangerous to fall behind with that moth monster lurking about. Can you keep up?” Voltaire asked.
Adna shot him a finger gun and winked. “Probably not. Don’t slow down for me, just focus on getting them out.”
He nodded. “Just follow the river if you fall behind.”
She had a moment of pride when Voltaire accepted her suggestion. It felt good to be a respected member of a team. The feeling was better than she had an explanation for. Strangely, this happened occasionally. Her distaste for nobles, an aversion to peppers, and the inexplicable need to train. There were certain things that when she encountered them, they felt like fact. Nobles sucked. Peppers were horrid. Now, clearly, this team atmosphere was her element—simple truth.
Adna shot a wary look at the quiet but powerful current of the river. It felt like a threat. That too was truth but not in the same way as the other compulsions. Adna couldn’t swim, she’d proven as much in her first steps out of the Dorark. But this was more, a deep and unwavering knowledge, cold and clinical. For her, water meant death.
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“If I can follow the river, don’t wait up.” She gave them permission firmly. “I’ll be fine.”
Adna waited until the men left earshot before she hacked up a couple more ruby chips.
***
Timbrelle blinked bleary eyes at the ceiling. The cobbled rock in every direction gave the appearance of the little fort Gren used to work in. She blinked again, trying to restore her depth perception through the fog. Someone stood just over her holding what looked to be a stove coil with a small salmon pink gem in the center and a handle that made the contraption resemble an old fashioned lollipop. She could see the aura washing over her like the person was spraying her down with a hose attachment.
“How long… how long have I been… asleep?” She managed to get out.
Timbrelle could feel people speaking more than she could hear them. They weren’t answering her.
“How long?” She repeated with force.
One of the voices peeled off, a familiar one. It answered, “Four hours.”
She looked to the voice, confused at his sudden appearance. “Morto? Were you collecting mushrooms too? Where is Adna?”
Morto pointed a long finger to the person laying in the bed next to her. Her breathing was ragged, her face pained.
Timbrelle swatted the tourmaline ping-pong paddle away. “Use this on her. I’m obviously doing better.”
“Doesn’t work on her.” Morto said. “Wouldn’t heal a scratch.”
She tried to sit up to inspect her friend, immediately halted at the pain and stiffness in her torso. “Ah! Oh Jesus. What happened?”
Voltaire spoke from the doorway. He waved for the random personnel to give her space. “We think you fell off a cliff. Found you at the bottom under a tree you landed on. Can you remember anything else?”
“Ellia! What about the maid that was with me?” She rushed.
Morto stepped aside to show her the woman in bed signing with a man in uniform. From the way they were both talking just a little too loud and speaking over one another here and there, they both appeared to be deaf.
An interface window made her flinch and sent a twinge of pain from her sternum.
Ping!
Experience the death of an aurora gem.
Reward: Your soul has become ‘unstuck’. You’ve learned the ability ‘snuff’.
Ping!
You have been forcibly attuned to a level 4 ruby.
Ping!
Due to your attunement being forced, ‘Ruby of Longevity’ is currently functioning at level 2. Its power is limited to 20%.
*Your Aurora abilities are visible under the Crystalurgy tab.
Ping!
Congratulations! You have been reunited with your party member. The passive effects of Soul Communion have been reinstated.
Ping!
The creature has taken an imprint of your soul.
Result: Your classification has been reassigned as “Prey”. Any buffs and debuffs will be applied accordingly.
*You can check the status of the hunt in your “Active Quest” tab.
Timbrelle froze. She’d never seen a notification like that. Not one that specifically mentioned the creature.
Pure rage at the notification bubbled up inside her. Had she not been prey before?
“Morto, Morto. Listen to me. We need to get me out of here. It’s following me and it will be here soon enough.”
Voltaire asked. “What do you mean? The moth creature we saw? It didn’t seem like the type to quietly follow.”
“Moth? What? No. The creature— the one that was up at the waterfall. It clicks and follows.” Timbrelle was experiencing wave after wave of nausea as she explained it to them. She was about to tell them about its mask when she recognized the sensation was coming from talking about the creature. “It’s headed here now. I need to get out of here.”
Voltaire chuckled and assured her, “I know it must be scary, but we’re in Camp Winterwald. There are two dozen experienced knights staying here for seasonal training. What could possibly go wrong?”
She groaned. “You guys really need to get me out of here—preferably before your jinx takes hold.”
“Timbrelle,” Voltaire would not relent. “If it is coming and is as dangerous as you say, we can’t afford to send anyone away to transport you. It would be best for you to get some rest and let the knights take care of this.” His tone was concerned, but it did not take away the sting of his patronizing words.
She turned away from Voltaire to Morto. “Get me out of here. Please. I’m sure now. It will follow me wherever I go until it gets what it wants. Please Morto. It… it leveled Tarsus. It wasn’t raiders from the wasteland or goblins like they reported. That thing completely… destroyed…”
Morto placed a hand on her forehead, pressing her skull lightly into the pillow. It was an oddly intimate gesture that helped abate the ruminating panic attack. “I understand. Voltaire, I need to take her to the temple.”
He rounded on Morto. “It’s so dangerous that you need to escort it to the capitol? Do you hear yourself? If it is this dangerous, we should deal with it here!”
“The real temple isn’t in Yost Proper.” She explained, realizing it for herself. “The thing could start heading to wherever the temple is actually located. It’s perfect!”
Morto nodded to confirm they were on the same page.
“…this is privileged information, you realize. Gods, she was right about you. You can’t keep a secret to save your life.” He rubbed his temples. “I have sworn my allegiance to house Groleck. Don’t tell me things like this.”
“Terry. Please keep this secret.” Morto requested in a tone that rang of sincerity. It was an uncommon tone to hear from the mysterious uncle of Nerrus’s congregation.
Master Voltaire visibly winced. “Argh! I invite you to pretend to care about my dignity as a Groleck.” Voltaire growled at him, already throwing his jacket back on. “And you had better be right about this. Mark my words: I am not going down in history as the man who destroyed Yost Proper.” He stomped out of the room shouting for someone to prepare a carriage.
“He’s a good man.” Timbrelle observed. “How long have you known him?”
“Since he was born.”
“..How old are you, Morto?” She asked, accepting his hands to help her sit up.
“Around two-seventy.”
She hissed in a breath as he righted her. “Wow. That’s crazy old. On Earth we live to seventy-something and even then, it’s not usually a life of high quality. I think that’s why we’re so very scared of aging.”
“Sounds tiring.” He answered conversationally.
Timbrelle cocked her head to the side. “You know? It really is.”
He helped her stand with distrustful eyes, arms half extended to catch her. Neither of them said what they were thinking. She shouldn’t be standing, talking, walking; she should be unconscious struggling to breathe. For some reason, that description more closely resembled Adna. Had she been with them at the waterfall? Timbrelle couldn’t muster up any memories with her on the bridge or hiking with Ellia.
“What happened to Adna? Why is she here?” She asked, testing her body carefully. It felt like she’d been hit by a bus. The deep bruising down her back notwithstanding, bandages were wrapped across her ribs drawing her attention to a deeper pain in her lower chest. “What happened to me?”
“You fell off a cliff. She found you.” He fished around in his pocket to present a handful of tiny red shards Timbrelle instinctively recognized as her very first aurora gem. “Been coughing these up ever since.”
“She has? Is this common among aurors when a stone breaks? Other people start…” She trailed off when he shook his head.
“No. This is wrong.”
Timbrelle was about to press him further when Voltaire came stomping back.
“We have a cart. Apparently the Rigel knightage doesn’t stock carriages at their training camps.” He shot her a disapproving look. “Why are you upright? You have a hole in your chest.”
“It hurts like hell, but I’m steady. Let’s get Adna and go as fast as possible.” She gave a thumbs up and hobbled to the door. “Ugh… I think I broke my pelvis.”
“You broke a lot more than that.” Voltaire swooped her up carefully. “You shouldn’t be awake until next week.”
“There was a huge campaign for milk when I was a kid. People drank gallons of the stuff every week. My generation has cement bones, bro.” She said.
“Bro? …you know what? Never mind. Is that why you’re so heavy? You have a small frame that’s surprisingly dense.” Voltaire carried her out to the wagon. It had been stacked with multiple layers of blankets. It was close to comical, the amount of padding the knights had provided. All about the cart sat boxes and crates of vegetables hurriedly jettisoned.
“Excuse you. I’ve been starving in the woods for months. I am not that heavy.”
Morto placed Adna beside her in the makeshift bed and took his spot beside Voltaire up front. Ellia would take the official Rigel carriage they were no doubt sending. She realized with a measure of guilt that she hadn’t said goodbye to the woman and made a note to invite her to the next blanket fort.
Immediately after leaving, Timbrelle understood the looks of pity from the knights that had seen her off. Being a cart intended for produce, it had no suspension whatsoever meaning that she felt every single bump and every last jostle. Dear Nerrus, she was in for a long ride.