Valin activated his selkie disguise before stepping through the portal in the north gallery back to Home Square. He spent three days in Home Square trying to decide what he should do next. The run back was much easier without the bind. The selkie was the slowest member of the group on the long run, using his speed magic to keep up.
They stopped at one of the god statues on the way back and ran through twenty eight different spells before they hit one no one in the group could cast. It was a sixth tree defensive spell. The group took careful notes on it, with both Alex and Companion committing themselves to learning it.
Todd and Companion were working on putting together a group expedition to the house outpost by the Speedwell exit. Valin still hadn’t figured out why they insisted on calling it the upgraded rest. They expected it to take ten days for a group of tier ones to walk out there and, if it didn’t spawn a transportation room, another ten to walk back. The next Challenge day was twelve days away. None of the tier one’s wanted to miss it, so the expedition was being planned for after.
Preparations for the next Challenge day were already in progress. Grandmother announced to her group at dinner that she didn’t want to hover over preparations and that she wanted to start scavenging around the south gallery. They would go down for ten days, once more returning two days before Challenge day. Valin made arrangements to go with them to the south gallery, where Grandmother would send him on to Seagrass. He never touched the Crystal there so he needed to be sent using someone else’s map. Grandmother was happy with all the information he shared about the interface and readily agreed.
South gallery turned out to be a near copy of the north gallery, with the addition of a deluxe crafting workshop. There were stations for crafting in wood, metal, fiber, leather and glass. Valin did a quick tour of it as Grandmother talked to the Innkeeper who was also tagging along.
“It’s the middle of the night in Seagrass,” Grandmother told the innkeeper. “We can do a quick trip over there so you can open the path. I have to warn you, doing all these trips back to back can make you queasy.”
“Queasy is ok,” Innkeeper replied. “I want to get back to the inn as quickly as I can.”
“Jeweler,” Grandmother called, “are you ready? I can send you through first. That way Innkeeper can see how I send someone using my map. Todd can pretend to be a tier three, and I’ll demonstrate how to send some through using their own map. The rest of you can wait here, Todd and I will be right back.”
Valin crowded into the transit room with Innkeeper and Grandmother. Todd was standing right outside, pretending like he couldn’t see the door. Grandmother activated the transportation console. She did a quick walk through of the controls for Innkeeper. Valin was shocked to see how many crystals were on Grandmother’s map. It looked like the humans were doing very well in the north.
Grandmother selected the crystal for Seagrass. The departure door opened.
“You’re first,” Grandmother said to him when he didn’t instantly step forward.
“Thank you for opening the path,” Valin said to the old woman. “I will come back to Home Square for the next Challenge day and journey with your halfling group to the upgraded rest after.”
“Thank you, Valin,” Grandmother replied to him. “I will remember your generosity.”
Valin nodded his head and stepped through the portal. He stepped out the other side to find the Seagrass portal keeper waiting.
“Do-Fa-Ti,” the portal keeper said in a surprised tone. “This late at night I expected the Elder and her pod.”
“The elder is behind me with a new portal trainee,” Jeweler replied. “She allowed me to travel with her to keep the cost down.”
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“Yes, that I believe,” the portal keeper replied. The arrival gong sounded. Valin quickly stepped out of the way and into the hall. He crossed the central pond and stepped into his shop. Valin rented an apartment above as well, but everything he owned of real value was in the shop, safely tucked away in inventory where it did not degrade.
The room was dark. It was still night in Seagrass. Valin did not turn the light on. The central pond was illuminated dimly by its floating lamps. He cast night vision on himself, and leaned against the side wall of his shop, looking out.
Todd emerged from the back hall first. He moved easily, with the alertness of a scout. His eyes swept the store fronts and lingered on Valin where he stood in the dark. Valin waved. Todd gave him a nod of acknowledgement.
The Home Square Innkeeper and Grandmother emerged next, walking side by side. Todd said something to them and Grandmother looked over at the Jewelry shop. Valin waved at her too.
They crossed over to the crystal, where they all touched it. Ray-Do-So the square elder must love these early morning visits, Valin thought sarcastically. Maybe she did, Valin corrected himself. The Elder was clearly giving preferential treatment to Seagrass, even after visiting all those other selkie shores. The humans were on the rise and would drag Seagrass up with them.
Home Square’s Challenge day did remind him of similar events he attended at court, just as he told Grandmother. Before he obtained tier five, he was just another of the King's men. He enjoyed a level of freedom he didn’t appreciate until it was gone. The pursuit of power led him here. When he first discovered the newcomers he thought they were hopelessly primitive and ignorant. It was easy to deceive them.
His mind was still grappling with the things he saw on the Speedwell, the wizard’s tower in the east. It was an ironic name, since there was no magic there and yet there was. He could still recall the wonders of it; the light painting of the entire world, the wheeled vehicles that carried you without effort, the metal hands that removed the King’s bind from him. He could visualize the bind, bleached of its color and sliced to pieces, sealed in a thin transparent bag sitting on a shelf, its power gone.
The humans came from the stars, and Grandmother at least remembered that. She saw magic fundamentally different from what Valin saw. He didn’t think he could ever see it her way, even though he lost his faith long ago. She looked at a field of numbers in the interface and started breaking it down. He watched in astonishment as the group worked together to try to solve the problem. His people long ago accepted that much of what happened was the will of the gods. The big difference between the elf and selkie worldview was that the selkie believed in one true god, while elves believed in the pantheon. The goddesses of light, earth, lightning and movement and the gods of air, water, fire and darkness.
Grandmother believed in logic. Those numbers meant something. They only needed to decipher what they meant and they could trigger the miracle they sought. He told Grandmother he would go with them back to the upgraded rest because he was curious to see if they were right.
It was more than that. He was starting to rethink the things he saw her do. The tour of selkie shores buying spells, selling them and giving away toys. It was a way to introduce humans to the selkie world. She wasn’t buying magic, but goodwill. When she sent her traders they would be given opportunities that might otherwise be closed to them. By the time she sent her soldiers, their suspicions would be gone.
No, Valin thought, that didn’t feel right. After allowing all the selkie to fight in the arena it was more likely the selkie would send warriors to fight in her service. If Grandmother sent soldiers it would be to defend those shores from outside invaders. She was building a different kind of empire. It was so different that Valin could not completely see it. It was so odd Valin could almost think that it was forming by accident.
Only it wasn’t. He saw her, out there on the path up to the boundary. She knew what she was doing. If she lived long enough, her vision of the future would sweep this world, slowly one small action at a time. After that, Valin thought, it might reach back out to where the humans came from in the stars.
The central pond was empty again, the three humans were gone. Grandmother led the way out the back hall with Todd watching her back. Todd was an honest stalwart ally. He would serve her well in the years ahead, but rulers needed more than that. They also needed those that walked in the shadows and told them their enemies secrets.
Valin suspected that Grandmother’s solutions to those secrets would be very different to what he expected. It will be interesting to see what they are, Valin thought. He turned to look at the contents of his shop as he considered what his next steps would be. There were no empty shops left in Home Square, but he’d asked around and found out that OpenSky was newly discovered. Almost all its shop space was available. OpenSky was so close to Home Square that Grandmother ran between the two. It would work out very well for a spy. Keeping him close but also out of sight.