It took a day for Autumn to fully recover.

If there was a prime moment to eliminate her and Deiman, then it would have been then. But to her surprise, Ara, Raoul and Mae helped them out instead. She was prepared to pay them coins or offer knowledge of a spell just for the act of sparing them.

After all, this was Grandis.

Everything had a price.

“Actually.” Ara began, wiping her mouth with the back of her sleeves. Half of her face was wet with drool after sleeping against Raoul’s back. She used the heat of the campfire to dry her face after splashing some water on her face. “We’re from Brandar!”

“Ahem.” Raoul cleared his throat.

Like yesterday, he was preoccupied with the monoliths again. A mysterious power emanated in this room and drew him like a siren’s call.

Ara shot him a glare.

“If you don’t want me to say anything then how about you start talking!?”

“A.R.A.” He punctuated the letters of her name as a warning, his voice draped with dread.

Ara growled in response like she had a pair of wolf ears of her own. She disobeyed his orders, but she wasn’t so naive to know why Raoul wanted her to keep her mouth shut.

“That’s Raoul for you. Grandis isn’t the place to muck around, but it’s nice to talk to people that don’t want to eat your fingers. Or imprison you. Or stick needles into your arms and conduct experiments. Ugh.”

Ara gushed again as a sleeping Mae shot awake in cold sweat.

“I-I’m still alive…?” Her disbelief amused Ara, who greeted her with a friendly wave. “… How are you also still… What is going on anymore?”

She kept her woes to herself and dared not to think about the elephant in the room.

Autumn shifted around the flames, inching closer to Ara.

“Needles? The Wandering Healer? Anyway, what’s an outsider doing in Grandis? I thought everyone was trying to leave.”

“That’s top secret.” Ara smirked smugly as she held out a hand in the air.

Suddenly, a crystal bow belonging to a violin formed in her palm, and she began poking at the flames.

“So secret that I don’t even know what the hell we’re here for. What is this place by the way? It’s not some ancient prison or sacrificial grounds, right?”

“It’s a puzzle.” Deiman quietly answered as he joined Autumn by the flame. “I think… Or a clock to time the Perigean Night. When the Moon is closest.”

“Where did you learn that from?” Raoul questioned.

“From Autumn…”

“And Autumn?”

Though his voice remained calm and seemingly inconspicuous, Autumn sensed a twang of animosity. His piercing gaze demanded where she received this knowledge from.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

“A Patron of the Highways knows this much.” She said as a bead of sweat ran down the side of her head. “It’s about the limit of the esoteric knowledge we have. I’m more surprised that you’re interested in this.”

Raoul’s reply was nothing but silence. Suddenly, the light that sat above the entrance of the room moved above the door as he dragged a hand along the monoliths. Blue rings of light hovered above certain words along the chiseled text, and he studied them unblinkingly.

“Eh, don’t mind him. That dude’s a mixed a bag. He’ll talk one second and he’ll go do his own thing the next. No wonder the shape of his heart is an oboe. It’s depressing.”

“I couldn’t imagine doing that as a mage.” Autumn mumbled.

“I couldn’t either.” Ara shrugged as Autumn’s attention moved to her crystal bow, and the conducting wand that sat by her hip.

She noticed that Ara was a Conductor; a type of magician that used musical instruments and music in the place of wands, staves and chants. Magic produced from music followed the same principles as magic that was formed using words, denoted as chants.

* * *

It was a structure based on one’s understanding of the magic itself as well as designing it to create an intended outcome. For chants, this involved knowing the principles of conjuring the magic. There was a steep difference between those who knew what fire was, how fire was produced, and why fire could exist.

Chanting was no more than a string of words to shape and transform mana. Music was the same, but the difference lay in what one wished to convey alongside the intent. Due to the number of instruments involved in major symphonies, it was compared to having multiple people chant at once. This made musicians highly sought after for warfare.

It was just a shame that they were not so useful on a smaller scale. They were generally useless, powerless, and existed for entertainment. Rarely could they hold their own. It took a specific kind of person to be able to weaponize music in the first place.

* * *

Ara was certainly one such person. The shape of the crystal bow possessed a sharpened edge. The conducting wand was in a place where daggers were usually kept. Ara also fastened numerous smaller weapons around discrete parts of their body.

“What? Something on my face?” Ara said, shifting uncomfortably as a hand dove into their clothes, fixing something along their chest. “So cold! Mae! Why don’t you come join us! Don’t think I can’t see the music in your eyes, you clarinet! You’re a musician too!”

Mae was doomed. If she refused now, then she’d look suspicious. If she agreed, then Raoul might notice her. She was damned either way. But she knew that this Ara person was immune to Raoul’s wrath.

Her best bet was to get close to her if she wanted to survive.

“Music! H-Heh. I was waiting f-for you to n-notice.” She stuttered miserably despite proudly placing her hands on her hips. “Clarinet? I-Is that what you see?”

“An instrument of redemption.” Ara snapped her fingers, grinning wildly at her. “One of my favorites next to the violin and the piano. C’mere and sit! I’ve been dying to meet another musician!”

Mae had no idea what she was talking about, but she played along for the sake of her survival. She expected nothing from Ara and prepared to have her ears chewed off by this chatterbox. But to her amazement, Ara’s knowledge of music was far more complex than she could have ever imagined.

It was like listening to the lecture of a Maestro; the highest ranking Impuritas of the Maestro of Flesh. At some point Mae forgot about her predicament as she was absorbed by Ara’s knowledge. She became intrigued, then invested, until Mae shook her head in disagreement with one of Ara’s philosophies.

“Music is something guttural. It must come from the flesh.” Mae argued. “It can’t come from the soul. Not a lot of people have that luxury.” Mae argued, drawing a person into the dirt which was surrounded by a giant heart. “Their hearts aren’t even their own, but they want people to see it. Not their soul. I don’t believe in that. Music can be much more. It can create new things.”

“I think that’s fine. It’s a problem for sure. There are no right or wrong ways.”

Mae expected Ara to be harsh with her.

How could someone with such knowledge not have an equivalent backbone of pride? All of the Maestros Mae knew preached and conducted their ways like they were absolute. There was no room in their hearts for another way or theory of music.

In the end, the ultimate goal of music was to feel it. It had to be linked with the self.

And what better way than for music to come from the flesh, plucked vocal cords, and hoarse lungs of oneself to truly feel the music?