One clear day, sky full of sun, her friends came to her in tears. Interrupting the song and dance they told Serune of their fears.
For years the water in the world had steadily been rising. That it never stopped to them was both alarming and surprising.
The druids had hoped that before now the water would have halted. They tried and failed and still it rose, so to Serune they bolted.
They came to say goodbye and to thank her for her song.
They had one last dance, and one last tear and began to move along.
The Sea Tree by Stelar Leafblossom
—
Kole’s finals schedule was less than ideal. First thing Monday he had his WIZ105 written exam, followed immediately by his written alchemy exam, with a two-hour break before his history exam.
Despite the packed schedule, Monday was the easier day for him. His martial exam would be on Thursday, along with his alchemy practical.
Kole blazed through the WIZ105 exam. When he finished, there was still an hour and a half left of the allotted two hours, so he spent a few minutes trying to double-check his work to no avail. As he reviewed the math and other work, his mind followed the same chains of thought as before and he couldn’t review it objectively.
It’s probably fine, he thought before standing.
All eyes in the room shot to him as he stood.
“Raise your hands for questions, please.” The teaching assistant proctoring the exam said boredly from the front of the room.
“I’m done,” Kole said.
“Are you sure?”
Kole nodded and really wished he’d Faded before standing to avoid all the attention. At his nod, a groan went out through the class.
He scooted out down the row of seats, getting even more looks, and turned the sheet in before walking out, embarrassed by the scene. The questions had been written on the board, and he’d answered them on paper from his spellbook, but even without that aid, none of the topics would have been difficult for him to answer. The magic paper had just made it faster.
He killed time on the green, trying to path his latest modified version of Thunderwave as he lay in the grass looking at the sky.
His alchemy exam, while not as easy for him as his WIZ105, hadn’t been too hard either, thanks to the magic paper allowing him to recall lectures. He was confident he’d get top marks and knew he would have at least passed without the magical aid.
History was a similar story. Perfect memory made recalling lectures simple, but he did have to argue his stance on the possibility of a missing race having been present among the pre-Flood denizens of Basin. Kole argued for it, as he liked the idea of there having been some elusive race that vanished without a trace, not because he particularly felt the evidence was strong—though there was enough evidence to make a case.
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And, once that was done, he went off to lose himself in his training once more and by the time he had to stop for his day of practical exams, he had successfully gotten Thunderwave down to 12 Will.
The alarm had gone off once more, but Zale and Amara had been in their own finals, so by the time the two girls reached the three boys waiting outside the door to Zale’s home in the basement of the art department, the signal had stopped.
Later in the week, his martial exam was embarrassing, but Kole had been assured he’d passed. He had to spar with the other quarterstaff students and had come out solidly in the bottom of the middle. The top spots had been dominated by Rakin and a few other martial students who specialized in the weapon for one reason or another, but Kole had done about average for the rest of the class that had been stuck with the weapon for one reason or another. Thanks to Zale’s training, he had the strength and endurance to handle the round-robin style tournament, and he was able to beat a few students who were actually more talented than him as he faced them near the end.
Thankfully, Pale Oak was not administering his alchemy practical, and he thought he did a halfway decent job harvesting the various plants that were required of him. The teaching assistant in charge only gave a small pitying look as Kole turned it in as opposed to the look of horror he’d feared.
Kole ran out of the exam back to his room to get back to Thunderwave, and by dinner time on Friday, had gotten Thunderwave down to 11 Will.
“Only one more to go!” Zale said excitedly at dinner.
Kole had needed a break after the breakthrough and elected to meet everyone. The dining hall had a festive atmosphere, as most of the students—save for the PREVENT ones—had completed their exams. Zale was only stopping by to say hi, before going out to celebrate with Harold.
When Zale excused herself to go, Kole followed her before he could think to stop himself. Zale wasn’t wearing her illusory disguise that day, and he didn’t want to see her get hurt again.
“Zale wait,” he said catching up.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, concerned.
Kole took a moment to figure out what he actually wanted to say.
“Are you okay?” she asked again.
“Just press him why,” he said, voicing a half-completed thought.
“What?”
“Harold,” Kole said. “If he bails on you again. Don’t accept his excuses. You deserve a real answer.”
“Okay…” Zale said, not sure how to respond.
Kole had the urge once more to turn invisible to escape the silence that followed—something he’d not thought of doing in a while, he proudly realized.
Zale excused herself when Kole didn’t follow up with anything else, and Kole too went on his way to put in more time on Thunderwave.
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Saturday morning, Kole begrudgingly met the other for breakfast for their pre-PREVENT final discussion. He’d gotten close to pathing the latest modifications to Thunderwave, and he hoped this would drop the cost from 12 to 10. He’d yet to make such a large improvement in a single iteration, but he thought he was starting to get the sense of it and he was feeling optimistic.
Kole was the last to arrive. Zale was present with her illusion bracelet engaged, and as such her eyes looked a little red. They made eye contact when he sat with his food, but she only gave him a small tight smile before turning back to Amara with whom she was speaking.
Kole ate mechanically, half his mind in the Arcane Realm pathing the spell. He had his two clarity potions with him. While he wasn’t supposed to use them during the final, he planned to use all his Will preparing, engage in the PREVENT battle royale, take another, and then hopefully cast three spells in front of Underbrook to pass the class. Will poisoning be damned, if Kole could pass he’d manage to be cut off from his magic for the following week to recover—though he had no idea what he’d do with himself for that week if his Will was deprived of him.
As Kole was about to take another bite of the dire chicken egg steak—a disc cut out of a hardboiled egg from a dire chicken—all their pockets began to emit the buzz of alarm that signaled the portal had opened.
They all looked up and froze before bursting into action.
“Follow me!” Zale shouted as she ran out of the dining hall.