We stood around a table in the guard cafeteria, staring down at a large map which had the camps and towns throughout Boralis listed on it. There was soft discussion outside as people took time to relax from the hard day of work packing and cleaning up all the items from the camp. I had finally changed out of my slave outfit, now wearing a shirt and pants I’d stolen from the guards. It was a lot more comfortable than the rags I’d been wearing for the past 5 years. A few others had also followed suit and had swapped out clothes. That included Ruby, who was circling the table and studying the map, making mental marks on several locations. Out of fear of potentially rousing her anger, none of us had interrupted her.

“Hmmm… I think I see how we can get there. Depends on what you want though, but you can definitely hit some camps on your way to Corith. I mean, there’s only one other camp, but there’s a specific border crossing with Corith which should allow us to continue our travels southwards while hitting other locations.” Ruby scratched at her temples as she surveyed it, continuing to mutter small nothings under her breath.

I leaned forward to look at the map before turning to her and asking her the question which she had just pushed onto me.

“Wait, what I want? You sound like you’re giving me two choices here.” I turned to see the rest of the people surrounding me all having a similar reaction. It was the main crew, including Elina who had been off managing the magore weapons and a few others who were interested in hearing the planning. Those who hadn’t worked with me until the night of the revolt gave me a lot of suspicious looks, seeming to doubt my general character. Ruby looked back up from the map and nodded at me.

“Yeah, two choices. First choice is taking the off road approach, Technically safer and means we probably won’t have to deal with as many Arlinian soldiers, but we don’t have the same level of clear directions. Plus, we won’t be able to take the carts with us and the strigs are going to be a lot harder to control. So Sera over here is going to have a hard time. Still, less forces and we can probably go in a straight line for the most part other than occasional stops at towns.”

So safer overall, but less carrying capacity and Sera won’t have a strig to ride on.

“Then there’s the option of going on main roads. It’ll keep us going in the right direction consistently, since we can just follow the roads in between locations. Also means that we’ll have the ability to utilize the carts and the strigs, so more carrying capacity. Using the roads, we can easily get from our location, through the refinery and towards the next town. Bir is a good town and will probably be willing to help us judging from how they acted towards Arlinians last time I went. If there’s any place in Boralis which would love to give a helping hand towards rebel activity, it’d be them.”

That sounded good. Any support we could get from local people would help out a ton.

“And the downsides?” Alex asked, keeping Ruby moving as she began to get distracted by the map again.

“Oh, the downsides. Well, it’s the main roads, and that means we’ll probably run directly into Arlinian forces a fair amount of times. They don’t have much here, since they’re currently focusing their efforts on the newest campaign but that means we will have to deal with them. Plus, going the main road means we’ll have to go directly through the magore refinery. If we go on the main roads, we’re going to be doing a lot of fighting and might be a tad bit easier to track, but we should move at a consistent pace. In my humble cartographer opinion, offroads is probably our safer option.”

I sat there, scratching my chin. It was two hard choices, neither of which I absolutely loved. Off roads did mean less Arlinian troops to fight and meant we could go in a straight line, but we’d have more issues with our ride and Sera might not have as easy a time keeping up with us. It’d also meant that I’d deal with less moral dilemmas. But going the main roads meant simpler travel, less chances of getting lost.

I wanted to, on some level, go the main roads. It made more sense to me and would help out Sera and our other injured more. It was a safer option in different ways, and it’d also mean that I could transport more supplies. I was working with a lot of people, so the more supplies and the more carrying capacity, the better.

Something was starting to itch with the shirt I’d stolen from the guards. I took a moment to scratch at it before pausing suddenly. In a fantastic moment, a concept clicked in my head.

“We take the main roads. I figured out how we’re going to do it.”

***

“North, you just heard what she said, right?” Sera leaned forward on the table to meet my face, allowing her crutch to clatter to the ground. Another slave next to us picked it up again to lean it against the table. “We’d be doing a lot of fighting with Arlinian forces. More than necessary.”

“No, we don’t have to. All we need to do is wear the right clothing.”

A collective “huh?” resounded throughout the room, although Elm appeared to be unphased by the suggestion.

“I think I get where the kid is going, but it’s not that great of a plan either. You’re saying we use the outfits of the guards to pass as Arlinian troops?” Elm pointed at my shirt.

“Yeah. One thing I noticed when looking at the soldiers was that their outfits were almost the exact same as the guards. That means that all we need to do is to have guard outfits on so people think that we’re just a normal platoon, passing through Boralis territory.” There was a wide smile on my lips that was shining with pride. “The Boralis people won’t question us either because they won’t want to interact with Arlin troops, and the people here from Arlin are mostly new conscripts, so they probably won’t know too many other soldiers.”

I heard Elina pop out from her side to ask a question. “If we do that, you do realize that some of us are a tad too distinct to come off as Arlinians?” Although it was unstated, she was likely referencing her own tan skin and steel colored hair, two traits which wouldn’t be found in Arlin.

“But that’s the thing. Not all of us have to be dressed up as soldiers. All we need to do is to have a few people keep wearing our old clothes and we can simply say that we’re transporting them from one location to another.”

There were a few collective nods around me out of what I believed was agreement. Sera still looked to be contemplating my words but Alex at least seemed to mostly be on board. I hadn’t seen the rusted Nacilian smile in a while, but it was looking like one might be forming.

Ruby moved across the table to tap me on the shoulder and whisper into my ear.

“You said you were going to get me paper, right?” There was a bit of hope in the voice. I nodded in response.

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“Yeah, I found some paper under one of the guard's beds. I was hoping after you map out our path, you could make a copy of the map and give it to Nicole’s group.” I patted her on the shoulder. “It’s in my old bunk.”

I didn’t tell her the full story behind the paper. When I was rummaging through the guard’s items for clothing to wear before the meeting, I found a few loose pieces of paper hidden under a feather pillow. There were a few empty sheets along with half written letters and a bunch of erotic drawings of the female form. While I didn’t spend much time looking at them, some of them did seem to look like some of the women at the camp. Shaking that mental image out of my head, I returned to Ruby and gave her a soft nudge in the direction of the bunks. She violently shook her head up and down, a few tears of joy welling up in her eyes as she darted outside and in the direction of her long desired paper.

Elm rounded the table to walk behind me and patted me on the back.

“Good shit kid. Better keep it up if you don’t want to get all of us killed.”

“Thanks for the reminder sir.”

Trying my hardest not to.

The decision making was done. In the morning, we would gather supplies, outfits and preparations for the road while parting ways with the Mylian group. It would probably be an odd experience, leaving the place that I had been forced to live in for 2 years behind. But for tonight, we would celebrate and relax as we prepared for the future to come.

***

My second time attempting to drink brandy went similar to the first, even though I had mentally prepared myself for the bitter taste. I choked a bit as I swallowed, a few tears welling up in my eyes. Elm and a few others around me laughed at my reaction as they casually sipped away at the drinks that the guards had hoarded.

There was another fire tonight, but it wasn't a funeral pyre. It was a simple large bonfire that had been created to celebrate the occasion and talk with others around it while the sun slowly set in the distance. The night sky had grown darker and darker and the amount of lanterns that had been sitting around the camp increased. As I sat on the ground, watching the fire and the others around it merrily talk with each other, I felt a soft hand tap upon my shoulder. Expecting to see a familiar face, I instead found one of the penal laborers staring down at me. She was small, her body and face reminiscent of Twig. Her hair was a much darker color, a dirty brown that had grown long and unruly.

“Thank you.”

I smiled back at her as she wandered off into the night, finally being able to explore the camp of her own free will. It was easier to ignore the pile of corpses that were off in the distance now that I could focus on the people around me who were alive. It was a morbid sight and did make me uncomfortable when staring at it for long periods, but it would send a message to the group who would find this place.

I finally let my focus come back to the slaves around me who were telling stories of their past before they ended up in the camps. Most of them looked to be older and were likely people who came into the camps later in life instead of extremely young like myself. On the opposite side of the fire, I could make out a large man who seemed to tower over the rest of us in size. It was faint, but his voice appeared to be extremely calm and passive in contrast to his demeanor. Before I could put a name to the individual, I heard Elm speak up to the side of me.

“Kid, you mind showing the people here the little trick you can do?” Elm’s speech was surprisingly coherent, but it was clear the alcohol was having an effect on him. He may have drunk more than usual to deal with the pain of his new injuries.

I sighed in response before lifting up my right arm into the air and asking the mana to hide it from sight. The limb faded out of sight into what looked like empty air. A few of the people around the fire got up to try and study my arm and get a better look at it. From their perspective, it looked as though my upper arm simply stopped existing past my elbow. Elm threw a small rock over to me which I instinctively caught, holding it in my palm. It looked as though it was floating, although when I closed my fist it too began to disappear from vision. Those at the campfire stared in amazement at what had become to me a natural action. I took a deep breath as my arm faded back into vision and I let the rock fall out of my hands. There were a few misplaced claps as the stone hit the dirt.

“Thanks.” Elm took a moment to survey my face. “You gonna be ok? You look more shitty than usual.”

Yup. I feel like shit.

“I could use some sleep. I’ve been delaying because I’ve wanted to get everyone ready.” I had been working with adrenaline for the most part, and the ideas which had helped us plan out the trip was coming off a brain that was mostly on autopilot.

“Then sleep. I don’t want the leader nodding off mid journey.” He nodded towards the bunks. I relented and got up. The sounds of everyone outside cheering and having a good enough time was enough for me to feel happy. It was going to be a big day tomorrow as I got everyone together, got to know my new comrades and headed off into the unknown woods of Boralis.

***

Elm watched his student wander off into the night and felt something tug at his old heart. The kid was a unique one, that was for sure. The word student felt weird passing through his mind, as it was something which he had never really desired. His research had distanced himself from others in a way few could understand, and an apprentice would only interrupt and slow him down. He desired to help his people above all else. In that way, he was an exemplary citizen of the empire which coveted desire.

His apprentice was an oddity. A naive light mage who was adamant to learn and often struggled to think things through. He wasn’t the sharpest tool in the toolbox but he learned fast. Elm prided himself on his in depth understanding of the technology, but most couldn’t pick it up as quickly as him. When Elm had challenged him to fix that burner, some part of him was hoping that he would fail. He hated that part of himself, because it was the same part of him that loved Arlin.

The years of study Elm had put into mana had been thrown awry by him as well, which had been causing him his own personal headache. Excluding the cuff, Elm had put a lot of pride into his research and findings. Having the kid just ‘ask mana’ to help him and then it listening went against several principles of how magic was taught to individuals throughout history. Something about North’s mindset and his attunement appeared to have the right combination of factors to allow for mana to ‘listen’ to him as though it held some form of sentience.

Mana, at least from what his years of study and conventional knowledge had said, acted more like a natural flow. It was like a river, shaped by and shaping the area around it as it moved. If mana had a will, the best summation of that will would be to keep moving. It didn’t give a shit if you asked it to move, because it doesn’t respond to questions. It responds to flows and to direct commands. You gave the mana a direction to move or a state to change between, and it would do that. Yet here North was, asking mana to make him invisible like he was asking it to open a door. It was completely insane.

Maybe it was because of how his development had been stunted by the empire, both physically and mentally. North was small for his age due to the malnourishment of the camps, a sight which Elm had very sadly gotten used to. His mind simply interacted with mana in an unconventional way because he’d grown up without the normal avenues for understanding mana and the world in general.

Elm looked at the ground, staring at the stone that he had thrown to North. He extended his hand and focused on it.

Stone, please move.

Nothing. It sat still, unstirred. Elm attempted his usual method, and the stone floated up like normal before quickly flying into his palm. Either Elm’s methodology was too deeply ingrained in his mind that he couldn’t replicate the kid’s method, or it was just something that his aptitude could never access. As he stopped focusing, he could feel a sting of pain throughout his body. He’d hated admitting it, but Galen hadn’t held back. He did want to keep Elm alive, but the burns on his skin and the effects of the electricity passing throughout his entire body made movement feel more difficult and utilizing his stone attunement for long periods felt like reliving the first few seconds of that electrocution. He couldn’t tell North about it just yet, because he knew that the kid would run head first into trying to learn healing to fix him up, and he didn’t know what would happen then.

He just needed to wait to see what the future held for him and the kid. No matter what happened, Elm was sure that he was along for the ride.