“There’s Keira, she can settle it.” Flynt’s voice echoes down the hall as I step onto the second floor and follow the corridor down to the study.

The large interior room has its double doors propped open. It looks like the kind of place that Sherlock Holmes would have been perfectly comfortable in, with heavy plush carpets over richly stained wood floors, and filled with cozy, over-stuffed furniture.

Large, brimming-to-capacity, built-in bookshelves line each wall, interrupted only by the double-doors and the fireplace’s large, ornately carved mantle situated across from them. There’s a velvet-covered, round card table to one side, and Flynt’s desk is built into one of the bookcases opposite it.

Magical lamps stand in each corner, with likewise magical reading lights mounted into the shelving at regular intervals, all bathing the room in a warm glow that almost makes up for the fact there isn’t any natural light in here. Almost.

I usually find the room comforting: I like the weight of it, the insulation, the carefully organized clutter of the books. I spend a lot of my downtime in here, curled in the green high-backed chair by the fireplace, next to which a stack of my reading material continuously sits.

Today, it just feels stuffy and heavy, even without a fire going in the hearth.

My party stands around the card table, which has what appears to be three notices spread out across its top. They all look at me as I enter the room, and each reflect some kind of worry or concern upon seeing me.

I sigh. “I really have to work on my deception skills.”

Tyrus leans back against the card table, his brow knit. “That isn’t your Anthene just devastated me with his complete lack of historical awareness expression. What did you find out?”

Meg exchanges a look with Flynt, who shifts to the side to give me room in the circle, and I nestle in between him and Jonas, who gently touches my shoulder in a silent check-in.

“Do we even want to know?” Meg asks.

“It’s not about Nyssa—I don’t think.”

“That’s a relief, at least, right?” Jonas looks between us.

“What happened?” Flynt asks.

I meet his eyes and cringe. “Do you remember that night on the road, before the whole undead thing? Our campfire was joined by those other travelers, the ones who gave us the creeps.”

Flynt draws a slow breath at that, his jaw tensing as he exchanges glances with everyone else. Meg curses softly, while Jonas sits down in one of the chairs.

“On my way back from the Wide Sky, I ran into the hunter elf who was with them. Phaelen. Or, probably, more specifically, he engineered a run-in with me. Alone. I think he’s been looking for me for a while. He knew my real name, where I’d be.”

“What did he want?” Flynt’s voice is low and a little too deliberate. Meg gently, briefly, touches his arm, as if steadying him.

“He says he’s looking for the Stone.” That solicits some sharp exhales and mumbled, quiet oaths from everyone. Jonas covers his face in his hands as he props his elbows on the table. Tyrus rubs his back. “Phaelen is under the belief that I have information about it, and he was trying to intimidate it out of me.”

Meg folds her arms and shifts her weight to one hip as she studies me, chewing on the inside of her bottom lip. “How would he know about that? You haven’t told anyone but us, right—not Anthene or anyone?”

“Of course not.”

“And we haven’t told anyone.” She looks around at the others. “Right? Tyrus?”

“Hey. I’ve been mum. I know better than to spread our business elsewhere.”

Flynt raises an eyebrow. “Even to your friends you don’t think we know about?”

Our rogue narrows his eyes slightly but offers a small smirk in response. “Even them.”

Jonas sighs. “We haven’t even told Nyssa about it.”

Meg nods. “Did he say why he thought that?”

“He said he was getting guidance. He didn’t go into a lot more detail than that, but he seemed pretty convinced he was being led to me somehow. He implied that’s how he found me, how he got my name.”

Tyrus shrugs slightly. “Doesn’t make it true. He could easily have done it just by asking around. With him as a hunter elf, too, it wouldn’t be hard to get information.”

“Sure,” Meg agrees. “But guidance is a strange word to use for tracking someone down.”

There’s a beat where I think about coming out with everything, using this as my opportunity to just come clean, to explain the [System], explain myself. I’d been thinking about what I might say my entire way back: how I might approach it, all the possible responses they might have.

But I find myself freezing in the moment. Adrenaline spikes through my veins, I feel dizzy, pins-and-needles bite at my hands—it’s the closest to a panic attack I’ve had since I got here.

I can’t do it. Not yet. I’m just too afraid. I can’t risk losing them, especially not now.

But I can float some of it and see how it lands.

“He had these spectacles, I guess they were. He suggested that they let him see the world differently.”

Meg frowns. “What does that mean?”

“I’m not sure. It was like he thought he was getting this guidance through them. He said someone gave them to him a while back and they changed his life. Have any of you ever heard of anything like that?”

Everyone shakes their heads—except Flynt, whose expression furrows as he braces himself on the back of the chair pushed into the table, and he draws a slow breath.

“My father has a pair of magicked spectacles. They’re small, very old, have silver wire frames. They’re one of his most prized possessions, but I’ve used them a few times. They provide access to what he calls the library.”

“What does that mean?” Meg’s voice is slow, trepidatious, and the rest of us all watch Flynt closely.

“In my experience of them, they work like a more in-depth kind of identification spell. You look at a magical item through the spectacles, and they give you details about it. Age, purpose or intention, level of magic, a danger rating, a name for the item if it’s unique enough, that kind of thing. I suppose someone could interpret that as a type of guidance, but I don’t think there’s any communications capability to them. I suppose you could, theoretically, imbue them with something like that, but I don’t see what the point would be.”

Tyrus thoughtfully smooths a hand through his beard. “That information must come from somewhere. Does he have any idea what this library actually is?”

Flynt shakes his head. “Not that he’s shared, but there are plenty of artifacts that provide various types and levels of knowledge. The Sphere of Halsmere, or the Tablet of Ballis? A half dozen others. Mages at the Academy have ways of tapping into those from afar. I suppose I always assumed it was similar, if a bit more limited in scope. Da doesn’t have natural magical abilities, but he’s not an ignorant man—he wouldn’t carry something that was dangerous.”

Jonas draws a deep breath, then hesitates a moment until he feels all of us looking at him, which makes him flinch.

“Jonas?” Meg prompts.

“I was just wondering if it could, theoretically, work on people.”

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“These spectacles give insight on magical items, but could they offer a similar insight on magical people?” He looks between us. “If I put them on and look at Flynt, would they identify him? Could they tell me that he’s a nature mage, or maybe even offer insights into the types of spells he knows? If he looked at me, would it identify me as a channeler with a healing repertoire? Could they even read someone’s purpose or intention the way they might an artifact?”

Meg nods. “What if he looked at Keira through those glasses, and it came up with some kind of… I don’t know, goal? Given what we spoke of earlier, maybe the Stone was on her mind?”

“It feels like a reach,” Flynt says. “Magical items don’t really work like that. They have to align with a certain Essence signature. This might be etheric, like that fireplace wand affecting the state of something to set it aflame, or it could be personally, like a protective ring resonating with someone’s individual Essence to boost their relative resistance. But that’s why mind manipulation artifacts have generally been disproved—people’s Essence signatures are too individualized for any single item to work broadly. Even if they could be used to identify people, the spectacles would have to have been attuned to Keira’s Essence, specifically, in order to read much more than the basic information that he could have likely gleaned from just looking at her.”

“Would your father let us take a look at them?” I ask.

“Possibly. I don’t know when he’ll get back from Ruska, though, and I don’t feel comfortable going through his things. He likely took them with him, anyway.”

“We’ll put that on the list, then,” Meg says, frowning down at the tabletop. “I just can’t think of how else Phaelen would know. Not unless there really is some greater power feeding him information.”

Jonas scoffs. “Oh, sure. You mean like Certain’s Guiding Hand, or something else just as real and not-at-all-made-up?”

Flynt frowns at that, then glances at me, brow creasing slightly. His expression is quizzical, as if something just slipped into place for him. He doesn’t say anything, though.

“I hear you, Jonas, I do,” Meg says. “But I’ve seen people do some amazing things with divine magic. I don’t think we can dismiss it so entirely.”

Jonas sighs. “You’ve seen people do amazing things with life or nature magic that’s been dressed-up to appear divine. It’s all glamors and tapping into what you want to see or hear. If there are gods out there, they have other things they’re worried about beyond those of us on the material plane. There’s a reason they stopped being widely worshiped.”

“Then how would you explain it?” Meg asks. “What Phaelen knows, I mean. A lucky guess?”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

“More than likely, it goes back to how I was suggesting he could have found her in the first place,” Tyrus says. “He runs into us on the road into town. When he gets here, he’s approached by someone. You’re the second hunter elf I’ve seen lately—you must know the one I’ve seen a few times at the Wide Sky? Long legs, lots of hair, even more strange questions, has a peculiar name?”

“Hey. Meg has more hair than I do.”

Flynt suppresses a smirk. “That’s what you take issue with?”

“She keeps hers contained,” Tyrus replies, flipping the end of Meg’s nearly four-foot-long braid. “But this information then intrigues our creepy acquaintance, he’d inevitably remember seeing you on the road—he was clearly curious about you. He asks around, links you to Nyssa, maybe overhears a few things or convinces someone like Anthene that he’s your brother or cousin or what-have-you, asks if he could get some information on how to find you…”

“Wouldn’t Anthene have mentioned something in that case?” I ask. “I just spoke with him.”

Tyrus scoffs. “I’ve known cave worms with better memories.”

“Why would he have waited so long?” Jonas asks. “Phaelen, I mean. It’s been well over a month since we crossed paths.”

“Maybe he wanted to get all the information he could for maximum impact. He’s an elf who seemed like he’s been here for a while, so he probably has contacts. He does a little more digging… I don’t know. Maybe contacts people back in Gerai. Maybe he hears some rumors of what Nyssa’s been up to? What I do know is that I’ve been involved with underground organizations before. They’re never as leak resistant as they think they are.”

Flynt nods slightly. “That could be. It still presents the question as to why, though.”

Tyrus shrugs. “What’s that you call it, Keira? Weird elf shit? We all saw how he reacted to her that night on the road. There’s a reason we spent that night the way we did. Maybe he’s just three-hundred years old, bored, and playing a game we don’t understand in order to… I don’t know. Teach her a lesson or something.”

“That could all be true, but I don’t think it’s just about me. He said that he thinks the Stone can stabilize the magic in Qeth, and that doing so could save his home country. I suppose it could just be a line, but he seemed pretty sincere.”

Flynt frowns, and exchanges glances with Jonas, who matches his expression and shakes his head, scratching a hand through his closely cut hair.

“My magical training isn’t as comprehensive as Flynt’s, but if there’s anything I understand, it’s transference and necromantic magics, and everything we’ve read about the Stone of Ylaura suggests it falls into one of those two categories. If the fading is real, then it’s because Essence is finite, and it’s being used up or otherwise lost. The Stone would need to have some way of creating more, and there’s nothing to suggest it’s able to do that.”

“I’d agree.” Flynt says. “Though, to be fair, the notes Keira found have as much contradiction in them as anything else. We have to treat it all as just theory, at least until we find the thing and take it to an expert. Which, maybe this whole thing suggests we should make that a bigger priority.”

“Couldn’t that just make her a bigger target?” Jonas asks.

“I think I’m a target regardless of whether or not we have the Stone,” I mutter. “I’ve put him off for now, at least a week.”

“That’s not a lot of time. Any direction we go, we’re looking at days on the road,” Meg says. “I doubt we’ll be back in that time frame.”

“I’ll cross that bridge when it comes. I just needed to get myself out of there.” I sigh. “I think I’d rather know more, frankly. At least with more information we might have a clearer idea what we’re protecting and why—or even if it’s worth protecting at all. If it can stabilize magic, would that be a bad thing?”

“In and of itself?” Flynt shrugs a little. “Hard to tell. I’d be concerned about what might come along with it and how that stabilized magic might be used and manipulated.”

“There’s no way something like that doesn’t shift the balance of power,” Tyrus agrees. “I doubt humans and dwarves would fare too well in that situation. ’Course, it might shed more light on Terravin interest in the whole thing, though.”

He looks over at Flynt meaningfully, which I suppose answers whether or not he and Jonas had been brought into confidence as to why we might be interested in following Nyssa’s trail.

“Indeed. Which I suppose brings us back to our options.” Flynt sets a hand forward on the table, directing our attention to the notices. He points out two looking for escorts north—one all the way to Ruska, and one to Crossing, which is a day or two shy of the capital. “We can head up to Ruska, like we talked about last night, see what opportunities there are up there—including seeing about tracking down the last location on that map—and we could potentially meet with Da to try to get information on the library.”

He then points to the remaining notice. “Or, we make use of Keira’s fully elven credentials to follow Nyssa’s trail to Gerai. I do still know people at the Academy, and while they probably won’t have first-hand knowledge, they may still have some theories about Phaelen’s resource, and some of them may also be able to give us more information about the Stone—we just might have to be careful about our inquiries.”

“The Gerai escort does pay better,” Tyrus points out. “We could probably negotiate the rate up, too, if we wanted. Keira’s a hunter elf ranger, who I’m sure the city adventurer’s desk would be able to offer some referral for. That’s going to be good currency to the types of people who would demand an elven escort in the first place.”

“That’s very true,” Meg agrees. “I also think the Nyssa question may be more pressing. We can probably avoid Phaelen for now—or at least, put him off if we need to. But if Nyssa isn’t on our side the way we need her to be, then I’d really like to know that sooner rather than later.”

“Though, as you said earlier, that does assume we can track her down in the first place,” Flynt says. “Gerai is larger than Oosal, and she’s not going to stand out as much there, being as it’s the elvish seat and all.”

“True. But I still think we should give it a try.”

Jonas nods. “I agree. I vote Gerai.”

Flynt looks at me and I shrug. “It does seem to have a tighter time frame. We might as well see what we can learn.”

“Alright. Gerai it is. I’ll go back to Layrus and have her organize a meeting with the client first thing in the morning. With any luck, we can set out by midday, get to the Western Road junction by nightfall.”

“Great,” Meg says, nodding and stretching. Either her back or her shoulders—possibly both—pop in the process. “In that case, I’m going to see if the Emporium has restocked the healing elixirs, and if not, I’ll take a trip down to the apothecary.”

“The apothecary is so over-priced,” Tyrus grumbles.

“Better than not having anything. Keira, can I have the purse?”

“Oh, sure.” I fumble with my bag and reach in. There’s a weird, finger-numbing snap, which has happened a few times since we teleported into that grove with the dragon skeleton, but despite that, the bag’s magic doesn’t let me down, and I withdraw the medium-sized pouch where we keep the bulk of our party funds. I toss it across the table to her. “Enjoy. Keep your eyes peeled. I don’t think he followed me, but better to stay alert.”

She grins at me. “I’m always alert.”

“I’ll go with you,” Jonas says, pushing himself up, and he follows her out of the room.

Tyrus frowns and folds his arms across his chest, looks at me. “You’re going to spend the rest of the day reading, aren’t you.” It’s a statement, not a question, and when I exchange glances with Flynt, Tyrus sighs heavily. “Right. I’m going to see what there is to eat.”

I frown as he leaves and glance slightly up at Flynt. “Am I boring?”

He chuckles. “Possibly.” I move to make for my usual chair, but he reaches out and his fingers brush my elbow, stopping me short. “Keira. You can confide in me, you know that, right? I won’t think any differently of you.”

“What brings that up?”

“Something Jonas said just reminded me of the day we all met. After the others had left, you asked me about something, and I made a joke, some comment about Certain looking after you—do you remember?”

I draw a slow breath. “A little.”

He hesitates, but then touches my arm again as if reassuring both of us about something. “Please don’t be offended by me asking this, but do you still see what you thought you were seeing?”

Leave it to Flynt to crit his history check. It was more than two months ago. So much has happened since then, and I can’t remember what exactly I said to him. I know it wasn’t much, just something vague, enough to open the door but not enough to sound too bizarre.

I hesitate briefly but find myself offering a single slight nod. He frowns, and I watch him consider this. I can almost hear him trying to put into words what he’s thinking, to determine what he wants to ask.

“I don’t know what it is, Flynt. I think it’s… you need to understand how different Qeth is from where I come from. You know how ill-equipped I was for everything. What I see seems to help put what happens into a perspective I can understand. It… I think it helps me to listen to my instincts.”

“Okay. Does it connect to this Stone?” He studies me carefully as he asks this. “When you were so focused on searching for it, on following the quest, as you called it? Was this sight responsible for the idea?”

I chew on the inside of my mouth. “I think it made me more conscious of it.”

He draws a slow, deep breath and holds it. His hand still rests on my arm, and he gives it a light squeeze. “Almost like something was giving you guidance, then?”

“Maybe.”

“Why didn’t you say?”

“I had no idea how to explain it. I didn’t know how any of you would react. We still barely knew each other.”

“But we followed you, didn’t we? Even when it got bad. Even when we probably shouldn’t have. Trust goes both ways, Keira.”

“I know.” I shake my head. “But I have a feeling seemed easier to understand than I saw something in my mind, and I can’t explain where it comes from. I didn’t want you to think I’m delusional. I’m not.”

“I believe you.”

“Maybe you do, now. I don’t know if you would have said the same thing earlier.”

He suppresses a cringe and withdraws a little. He doesn’t seem sure what to do with his hands, and he rubs them together before folding his arms across his chest.

I watch him and draw a slow breath, feeling awkward. “Why are you ready to accept this? I don’t know that I would, in your place. Actually, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t.”

Flynt shrugs lightly. “We’re surrounded by unexplainable and extraordinary things, Keira. They’re facts of life. I’ve seen someone predict a disaster down to the exact moment in time. I’ve watched someone else be brought back to life—not healed from the brink, not brought into some unlife, but actually returned from death, which all theory says should be impossible. Tyrus all but disappears in plain sight. Jonas can channel his life force into others. Meg is so closely linked to that sword of hers it might as well be an extension of her soul. You tell me that you see things that help you to do and know what you do and know? I may not understand it, but who am I to dismiss it?”

He shifts his weight and worries at his upper lip, a thoughtful movement that exposes his small lower tusks.

“That day. You asked if I saw it,” he says. “So, this isn’t something you’ve always seen?”

I shake my head. “Only since I got to Qeth.”

“And it does sound an awful lot like what Phaelen was describing, doesn’t it?” He arches his brow. “I mean, that’s what this sight is giving you, right? Guidance? Is it possible that he sees the same thing? That he’s getting his information the same way you are? Maybe even from the same source? There are a few commonalities between you: you’re both hunter elves from outside of Qeth who are following an adventurer’s lifestyle.”

I sigh and rub my forehead.

Obviously, I’m on that same page. It’s hard not to be, but the possibilities there frighten me. I want the [System] to stay something vague in the background, something that can easily fit as a figment of my imagination. I don’t like how the equation changes if someone in-world has access to it. That makes it feel like something real, something with deeper insights, with greater power. If it’s just in my head, then it’s safe and innocuous. If it’s not, though? That means it likely has an external source—a someone or a something behind it. And that all suggests motivations.

If that’s the case, there’s not a lot I can do about it. I know that. Trying to ignore it or pretend otherwise isn’t going to get me very far. But I’m also not ready to see the Matrix without being able to unplug from it. I’m not ready to second-guess every decision and every piece of information. I’m having a big enough existential crisis as it is.

I just really, really want all this to be a nice, safe (okay, maybe not the most fitting word, but it’s the best I have) coma dream. I don’t want to have been sucked into the machine, or to be lost in the multiverse. All of this should be merely proof of brain activity, a plea not to harvest my organs quite yet and to give me the chance to work my way back.

Is that too much to ask?

My throat tightens and I can feel my eyes sting a little. I glance down to try to blink the tears away before I answer.

“It’s certainly possible that he does, but I don’t think it’s a hunter elf thing.”

“What is your theory, then?”

“I don’t know. It seemed like it had something to do with where I come from, with what brought me here. Like I said—an ability to help me orient. But Phaelen and I are from different places. I don’t think that theory makes sense if he sees it, too, even if he needs the spectacles to do so. At the very least, it changes the meaning of what I thought I understood.”

Flynt hesitates before reaching forward and touching my arm again. His gaze catches mine, his bright eyes trying to convey too many things to track.

“If you let me in, I may be able to help.” His voice is low and cautious, but he leans in again, and bows his head a little. He’s not significantly taller than I am, but it’s enough to be meaningful. I can feel the warmth radiating from him. “Keira, I know you’re hesitant to talk about where you’re from, how you got here, but anything you tell me, it stays between us. I promise that. You can trust me.”

I rest my hand over his. “I know. And I do trust you, Flynt. I really do.” I don’t think I was prepared for just how true that statement was until I said it. “I’m just not ready. I’m so sorry.”

“Okay.” He leans in closer but stops short of touching his head to mine. He squeezes my arm again instead, then releases me and steps away. He gathers up the notices and offers me a small smile. “I’m going to go take care of this.” He waves the piece of paper. “I don’t know about you, but I’m all the more eager to get back on the road.”

I match his smile. “Same. I’ll be… here.”

Flynt nods and disappears out the double doors, his footsteps retreating down the hall.

The study feels empty and quiet, the atmosphere heavy. I draw a slow, shaky, deep breath, and hold it until my vision blurs. Dropping down into my chair, I hang my head down between my knees, letting my arms fall forward. My heart is racing.

I just want to log off.

Except… even with everything right now, I’m not sure that’s entirely true. And for some reason that I can’t quite articulate, that scares me even more than any of these questions and doubts.