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Chapter 25: Responsibility
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“Time is not your enemy, but your friend. To gain an honest understanding of a single subject, a grain of sand, say, or a flower; this might take an entire human life. Mastery of your mind, then? The Mindar age a thousand years before stepping foot from their great forests, yet you seek to conquer the sword in three years?” ~ From: “Tales of the Tower, an Exploration of the Meridian, Volume 3” by Corio, 4983 A.P.
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Logan blinked blearily awake, his eyes slowly adjusting to the soft glowing orange light of the fire. A lazy crackling tickled at his ears, no doubt wood and twigs cracking in the flame, and he shifted uncomfortably on a hard stone floor. He was covered in a blanket, he realized, and his head beat something awful.
He pulled a hand from the blanket and pressed it to his temple, squeezing his eyes shut and scrunching his face, wincing at the throbbing assault beneath his skull. A heavy hand thumped his back, accompanied by a familiar tinkling, clacking sound like marbles bumping into one another.
“Our august leader returns to the land of the living! Gave us a bloody scare, that you did mate.”
Logan opened his eyes a smidge, tilting his head upwards to see Tarn sitting beside him to his right, grinning, his dark skin reflecting the orange firelight like polished metal.
“Good to see you made it, Tarzan,” Logan croaked. His throat was still raw, the skin at its back torn, blood coating the inside. He coughed vigorously, doubling over where he sat, the pain in his head a stabbing knife.
Regaining a modicum of control, Logan lifted his eyes to look around the fire. Synec sat to his left, bow in hand, and Huck lay across from him, covered in a blanket like Logan himself, seemingly asleep. Ryan sat next to his father’s head, eyes fixed on the fire.
“Did we get it?” Logan asked, the question aimed at no one in particular. He remembered firing a final shot at the second llort, desperate to save Huck’s life.
His eyes lingered on the man’s sleeping face. He was alive, but Ryan’s eyes hinted at a deeper story.
“Aye we did. You didn’t hit anything with that final shot of yours though, had me thinkin’ there must’ve been a flyin’ fucker or som’n behind o’erhead the way your arrow sailed up to ‘igh ‘eaven. We could use you in the sands, mate, just don’ go shootin’ at anything shorter ‘an one ‘a these trees ‘n you’ll be fine!”
Logan snorted a laugh. It was impossible to be mad at Tarn, even when he was giving you a hard time.
Tarns boisterous smile tapered a bit, and Logan caught Synec glancing at him, cool, calculating eyes weighing him, measuring him.
“Only jokin’ ya mate. You’ve been holdin’ out on us, ay?” he asked, fixing Logan with a knowing smile.
Synec flashed a faint smile too, before turning away to look into the oppressive darkness beyond the firelight. They were in a cave, he realized; the llorts’ cave.
“What? What do you mean?”
Logan remembered the surge of emotion, a great welling up of fire, anger, and vengeance; a pressure, building until he’d pop like a balloon, then firing an arrow, then nothing.
His ring glinted softly in the firelight, its cool weight like the kiss of ice on his finger, the onyx stone at its center seeming to glow and shimmer.
“Blew a ‘ole in its ‘ead mate, nearly took the ‘ole thing right off.”
Tarn placed his hands together to form a circle, then placed it over his eye and looked through it at Logan.
“Remind me never to piss you off,” he said, lowering his hands.
Logan couldn’t remember anything past the moment of firing the arrow, but he believed what Tarn was telling him. Could he finally have passed that threshold that he’d felt inside of him so many times before during meditation?
His sides ached, dull and throbbing. His neck felt like he’d been in a car accident, and his entire body was sore, battered, and weary beyond anything he’d ever felt before. Despite it all though, a sense of excitement bubbled up within him like a child on Christmas morning.
“Susie,” he thought, “open my status page.”
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Race: Untethered Soul | Age: ??? | Name: Logan Dileva | Titles: Bulwark, Rei User (New!) | Affiliations: None
Affinities
Thrive | Space | Fire
Abilities and Skills
Passive
Boundless Potential
Active
Menu, Map, Inventory, Enhanced Looting, Status, Interpretation, Analyze, Quick-Swap
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
World Skills
Field Medic, Novice Swordsman, Novice Archer, Beginner Spearman, Beginner Paladin
Stats
Physical
Rei
Spirit
Speed: 7
Strength: 6
Stamina: 5
Resilience: 6
Dexterity: 6
Volume: 700
Power: 200
Focus: 7
Innovation: 8
Rei Control: 1
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Affinities: Thrive, Space, Fire? Rei power, volume, and control....
Almost all of my stats went up, and I finally have a point in control.
His mind raced as he wondered what the affinities could mean. He had a sense that they were related to "Rei," the power that, he assumed, had made him able to slay the second llort. But what would he be able to do with them?
The question marks, the titles, the sense of anticipation that’d been building in him for days, his interactions with the Huntress and Tarn’s mysterious ability to command his chains; it was all starting to make sense to him now. He felt like a shaded lens had been pulled from over his vision and he was finally able to see the world in its true form, with its true colors. In fact, the beads in Tarn’s hair did seem to have a faint shimmer about them, like a close-hanging mist, like light passing through dust.
He blinked and the mirage passed. But his vision did feel markedly different. Now that he focused on the faces of the people sitting around him, they felt somehow finer, rendered in a higher definition. The air had a sense of weight to it, a wildness, a life all its own. It were as if he had suddenly gained access to a world of experience, ever present yet previously beyond his perception, overlayed atop his own.
He felt a faint trace of energy, the power that had earlier consumed him, resting semi-dormant in deep in his core, behind his navel. He was cognizant of it as one was cognizant of their heartbeat, or of the sensation of clothes on one’s skin, so constant as to be almost imperceptible except upon direct and intentional observation.
Rei.
A word, a force that would change his life, he was sure.
He looked with new eyes at his companions around the fire, and frowned.
Ryan hadn’t looked away from the flames since Logan had awoken, not even looking at him once besides when he’d first risen from unconsciousness. His eyes were distant, hollow, his face a brooding storm cloud.
Logan struggled to his feet, his body protesting every movement, and moved to sit next to Ryan on the other side of the fire.
He settled slowly down into a cross-legged position, hissing quietly at the pain in his hips and abdomen as he lowered himself to the floor, a foot from Ryan. He said nothing, simply hugging his knees and staring into the fire, waiting for the boy to speak.
“Thanks,” Ryan muttered, his voice a barely audible whisper.
“Sure,” Logan said. He was unsure what Ryan was thanking him for, whether sitting next to him or killing the second llort, a feat he was still unsure of even doing.
Without turning his unblinking eyes from the fire, Ryan began to speak.
“I almost lost him… again. Why does it always have to be pa? Why can’t it be me?”
Logan’s face quivered as he glanced first at Ryan, then at Huck.
Alex’s face, covered in blood, eyes lifeless and open, mouth agape as sirens blared in the distance, a cruel orchestra from another world; his mother’s head, Lexi, her face almost unrecognizable, skin charred, long, dark hair burnt to the scalp in patches; his father, crawling out of the burning car, barely injured in a wicked twist of fate and demonic irony.
He squeezed his eyes shut, willing the images away, driving the butts of his hands into his eye sockets until the world was black and purple lightening.
He opened them to find Ryan’s surprised face, wide-eyed, staring back at him, firelight dancing on his cheek.
“How is he?”
The stoniness returned, emotion draining from his features like color from a photograph.
“He’s alive. We used his potion, still have mine left. But he— his—”
Ryan clenched his jaw, his teeth grinding audibly.
Logan put a hand on Ryan’s arm. He was so young, only ten or eleven, but to Logan it seemed as if he’d aged a decade in the last two weeks.
“He’ll never shoot a bow again, will he?”
Logan’s eyes widened, and he felt his breath catch in his throat.
Never shoot a bow again?
He looked at Huck now, more intently than before. The big man’s chest rose and fell, the whiskers of his thick mustache vibrating gently as he breathed. He noticed for the first time that the blanket on his right side seemed to lie too closely to his torso below his shoulder, as if tucked under Huck’s back, his arm on his chest. But his arm wasn’t on his chest; the bulge under the cloth that should’ve been there was absent.
Logan remembered the Llort’s fingers, like thick iron bars, wrapped around Huck’s arm.
It’s gone, isn’t it?
Logan stared dumbly, stricken, at the man who’d saved his life, the man who’d welcomed him into his home, the man who’d been the only real father figure Logan had ever had, lying on the cold, hard stone floor of the cave: a cripple.
Could they give him Ryan’s potion? Had it been three hours yet? The “severe spirit damage” effect of consuming more than one potion within a three-hour period had the potential to kill him, Logan was sure. Even if it had been long enough, would consuming another potion of the same efficacy help?
Logan felt suddenly helpless, careless, and idiotic. Why had they come here in the first place? Was it worth it, killing the llorts, finding treasure, progressing their skills, if the cost was their lives? It’d been sheer luck that Huck had survived at all, and now he’d never be able to wield a bow again. How would they get through the Suko’s like this?
It’s all my fault. If only I’d never suggested that we come back. I’m a hubristic fucking idiot, and I’m going to get my only friends killed for my own pride.
Logan looked around the faces of his gathered companions, suddenly feeling very alone despite the others surrounding him. Huck had let him take the lead and make decisions, but Logan had only felt comfortable doing so because the older man was always there behind him, supporting him, ready to step in if need be. Now he was well and truly alone, the burden of leadership an inescapable weight on his shoulders, threatening to crush him.
Tarn and Synec were experienced far beyond what he’d imagined upon first meeting them, that much was clear to him now after fighting with them, but they were hired help. Although they were professional, friendly, and courteous, he and Huck had been the ones in charge, while Tarn and Synec were just along to help. Now, for the foreseeable future, it was just him. If he, Ryan, and Huck were to live, it would be up to his leadership, his capability that would make it happen.
Real responsibility, a sensation so novel to him that the faintest experience of it eluded his memory, settled on his soul like the weight of a mountain.
“How long have we been inside the cave?” Logan asked, directing the question towards Tarn.
“Seven or eight hours. We ‘ad no idea when you and Huck would wake up, so we walked in a ways then set up camp. Cave’s huge; guess it ‘as to be to ‘ouse those things,” he said, waving a hand behind him, presumably in the direction of the entrance, “It’s surely night by now, but after walkin’ only a few minutes it was already darker ‘n a snilbog’s toenails.”
“A snilbog’s toenails?”
“Aye, figure’a speech mate.”
“Right…” Logan said as he looked around their small encampment; It wasn't much more than the fire, the two blankets, some rocks dragged over for seating, and a sled fashioned from some sticks and a bit of string.
There wasn’t any evidence of the Brightwood Deer’s majestic crystalline antlers, or any other treasure for that matter. He glanced at Ryan, who had turned to changing the bandages around Huck’s mangled, misshapen stump of an arm. If they were going to convince the villagers of Woolam to join them after this, then they’d certainly need strong evidence in support of their strength, wealth, and ability to survive the trip across the ominous mountains.
They needed to venture deeper into the cave.
Logan took a deep breath, bracing himself for what was to come.
“Ryan, Tarn, and I are going to keep exploring the cave. I need you to stay here and look after Huck, okay? Synec will be keeping guard too, so you won’t be alone.”
Without looking away from his work, Ryan nodded. Logan glanced towards Synec, who also gestured in the affirmative.
Logan got to his feet, careful not to disturb Huck, and made his way to the fire’s edge. Tarn sidled up beside him, a short wooden torch in one hand and a shortsword that Logan hadn’t noticed before now held easily in the other.
“This is perfect lad, I’ve got plenty of questions for you,” Tarn said in hushed tones, leaning in.
Logan nodded, looked over the camp one last time, his eyes lingering on Huck’s face, turned, and strode into the darkness.