Jace rose before the sunrise.  One of the weird side effects of living without electricity is he found himself going to bed not long after sunset.  Two or Three hours after sunset at most.  Of course with day/night being almost equal, and the actual day probably a little longer than an earth day, this meant he not only got a great night’s sleep, but he often was up an hour or three before dawn.  Of course back on earth he was always a bit of an early riser.  He just never liked sleeping in much. 

He hurried down through the tower and made his way to the beach, he only had a short time to finish making the focuses so he maximized all his effort on them.  There was something eerie about this predawn, that set his nerves on edge.  It was unnaturally quiet.  Usually you could hear some of the nocturnal lizard-bird things they called Shars making some sort of croaking noise.  Or some of the more irritating insects making some sort of noise.  Now, there was nothing, as if the world was holding its breath.

He worked quickly on the focuses, in order to finish and get the girls used to using them and tested out of their situation he had to get them started today.  He made an assortment of stone rings, staves, focus stones and hats.  The hats apparently were the most effective part, so he needed to make them no matter how stupid they looked.  Of course making them was a pain, because it required him to gather up a bunch of the fronds from the fern/trees, then transform them into something resembling a clothing/canvas like material, then further transform it into a hat like shape.  It was a pain.  He much preferred the rings and staves, those were simple to make. 

He couldn’t help but feel like something was staring at his back while he worked.  He had as many detection wards as he could have conceived surrounding everything within 300 yards of him, and it was detecting nothing, either in the air, sea or ground.  Yet he still felt like someone was standing right behind him.  It was an unnerving experience; especially in lieu of what Verna had told him about the hidden expert likely being a Kindred Emissary of a God.  It was Verna’s suspicion that it was an Emissary of Elis, only because of the way spells were being restricted.  Still she told him not to worry about who it was, because “all I have are theories, and it would be best not to be caught looking in one direction while the real foe takes you from behind.”

What she said made sense of course, he just wished she would talk clearer about who the foe might be.  Or even why she thought it was an Emissary of Elis.  He ended up reviewing the defenses that Verna had laid and had to admit to himself he found them impressive.  That said he ended up laying a few defensive wards he imagined as well.  He figured unless the foe was a sorcerer there was no more secure location on the island then the keep.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

He kept sneaking glances behind him as the oppressive silence continued on through sunrise.  Even the sea seemed to be calmed.  Making barely a whisper as small ripples slowly stroked the shore.  It was such a silent morning; he could barely make out the noises of the male student’s miles away going to class.  He didn’t even hear a rustle of plant life in the wind.  In fact, there was zero wind.

It was haunting.   

He gathered up the staves and goods after finishing the last item.  It sounded far too loud, he thought he could almost hear an echo from all the noise he was making.  The silence and isolation he felt was so intense, he felt an uncontrollable need to take a leak.  Restraining himself, figuring it would be the worst horror movie cliché to take a leak in this situation, he quickly made his way back to the tower in the keep, carrying all the focuses as he moved quickly.

The trip back was mercifully uneventful.  The tower itself was almost unnaturally quiet as well.  He had to work up his courage before walking up the stairs.  To his relief all the girls were waking up in their room on the 10th floor.  Since everyone looked like they were up he decided to start working with them now, likely Sam and Verna would make their way down to him on their own.  He ended up spending most of the morning passing out focuses to all the girls.  Everyone got 4, at least one head piece, then walked them through what they should be looking for and feeling.  Surprisingly they all were able to manage at least lighting a finger on their first try.  And about ¼ of the nude girls managed to make a weak pool of light on the ground in front of them.  All of the witches, much to his immense surprise were able to make the jump to channeler.

He left the rest to practice feeling quite pleased with himself, and made his way up to the top floor to talk to Sam about his plans for the rest of the day.  He figured this would be as good as any to bring those girls back to the academy and get them all to pass the test.  He was a little disappointed to notice that both Verna and Sam were missing.  The room felt lonely without them.  He was surprised that he included Verna with Sam in the ‘them.’  While he had no romantic interest in the alluring kindred woman, he found her presence comforting after a way.  He suspected that when Sam had their child, he’d be very thankful for Verna’s assistance with the baby.  Seeing as she had already experienced that twice with her own kids.  Her experience would take a weight off his mind.  He poked around a bit and saw nothing to indicate where they went to and headed back down into the tower to see if any of the women knew where they went.