The next day, after everyone had said their goodbyes, Tahir, Theo, Meti, Hasio, and now Shukri, left the Blooming Grove. With Dahlia’s pacifying presence, they avoided any predator that might have come across them, much to Shukri’s dismay, but she took to hunting for the group, and caught something every time she went to hunt over the two weeks between the Grove and Balrech. They trekked back across the expanse of the unclaimed lands, briefly passed through Paxoruche once more, and found their way to Esharia. During the trip, Tahir began attempting to teach Shukri the techniques that Murabi taught him, getting her started with manipulating aura. She struggled a bit, at first, but got the hang of moving around her aura shield in the same way that Murabi taught everyone else by the time that they reached Balrech.
Once they made their way into the city, Tahir reminded Shukri of his issue with the mage’s collective, telling her that they would likely try something once they realized he came back, since he and now Hasio had spurned them. He also emphasized that he didn’t want to fight them if he could avoid it. He had no desire to get entangled with an organization tied to Esharia’s royalty, and he felt content to just avoid them and keep his things safe with Callipho’s protection. He almost expected the guards to recognize his party at the gate, but no such misfortune fell upon them upon entry, thankfully. If all went well, they could do everything they wanted to in Balrech without issue. Theo wanted Callipho’s help with the elixir,Tahir and Hasio needed to qualify for platinum at the Redcloud’s base, and Shukri wanted to join the Redclouds herself, probably starting as platinum and if not then certainly gold.
Making their way to Callipho’s, they entered the shop with Theo giving an excited greeting. “Master Callipho! We’re back!”
“Well now,” The alchemist sat behind the counter of his shop, reading a book. Though he closed it and stood once the party walked in. “Back so soon? Or rather, I suppose your business in Isanthyr ended a good bit ago, and the next stage of the Redcloud’s operation hasn’t begun quite yet.”
“Yep! We’re still waiting on Murabi to tell us when to go to Osni, but we got something really cool from the Raven that I wanted to get your help on - oh right! We met the Raven and he recognized us.” Theo paused for a moment to get the order of how she wanted to tell her story together, and Callipho just smiled.
“Seems like we have quite a bit to talk about. Give me a moment and I’ll get some tea started.” After a moment of Callipho making his way to the back, and everyone but Theo following so that she could mind the shop, everyone met back up at the front to speak, with the alchemist going to sit back behind the counter. They introduced Shukri to Callipho, then went on to tell him just about everything that happened in Isanthyr and the Blooming Grove, leading up to Theo showing Callipho the recipe for the elixir that the Raven gave them.
“I’m sure the Raven has already apologized profusely for getting you involved in his mage guild politics, but I warned him that getting involved with them was more trouble than it’s worth.” Callipho said with a sigh. He glanced down into his tea with a small smile, as if recalling some pleasant memory. “Still, it is good to hear that he is doing well. And that he’d go against the whole of Itera for me, that’s certainly a stroke for the ego.” Setting his tea down, he took another look at the notes for the elixir. “I am certainly interested in making this elixir. All of you could benefit from raising your aura, no? Making multiple versions would take a bit of time, but I would love to get a good sense of their effects and the ins and outs of creation without letting them simply sit on a shelf. We could also work on mimicking some of the effects of my more stationary devices, Theoris.”
His eyes flicked back and forth as he ran them over the notes once more, but after a moment, he sighed, and set them down on the table. “It would seem your arrival in Balrech has not gone unnoticed. Might I ask you to take care of the oncoming commotion before it actually reaches my shop?”
“Huh?” Tahir perked up at that. He didn’t understand what Callipho meant immediately, but after a moment he heard, and felt, a rumbling in a kind of rhythm. The step of several pairs of boots marching in unison. Everyone seemed to pick up on the sound as well, and they quickly made for the door and stepped out into the street. Just as the alchemist told them, a dozen knights made their way down the cobblestone street, marching toward Callipho’s shop. The regular people on the street quickly moved to get out of their way, leaving the path perfectly clear for their approach. From what he remembered, the average Esharian royal knight had around the same ability as a platinum Redcloud, at least according to them. As he looked over the sight before him, Tahir pulled his sword out of his storage bag, but didn’t make a move to draw it. His eyes came to rest on the one leading the group, and his stomach dropped.
The one leading the knights had long, blonde hair, and piercing emerald green eyes. She wore an elaborate, gilded set of armor and carried a sword contained in a gilded scabbard, both bearing the coat of arms of Esharia. Tahir had seen her once before, during a parade and a military demonstration held by the royal family and the knights of Esharia. The second princess of the Esharian royal family, princess Cecily Nottfelde.
Theo, Meti, and Hasio seemed to recognize the presence of royalty as well, but Tahir watched as Shukri reached into her storage bag - the one Hasio found on the man who was killed by his own elemental falling on him - and he grabbed her wrist to stop her from pulling out her spear. “Don’t, Shukri, she’s royalty.” He warned. “If we start a fight here we’ll have to flee the country.” Shukri let out a growl and showed her fangs, but she let the spear fall back into the bag.
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Tahir knew that the collective would hold a grudge, and that they had connections to the royal family, but he didn’t expect them to sic the royal knights on him. The princess in particular acted as the leader of the knights - supposedly due to her being among the most powerful members of them, on par with a mithral or maybe even adamantine Redcloud, but that might just be a rumor the Esharian royal family started. Either way, it wasn’t something Tahir wanted to discover through firsthand experience. Still, he’d never heard of the royal family of the knights going out of their way to be particularly cruel. They seemed to have keeping the peace of Esharia in mind, so he might be able to talk his way out of this in a way that he wouldn’t with the Mage’s collective.
The Knights continued until the princess stopped them about 30 feet away from the shop’s doors, and she herself stepped forward, looking over the group that had come out to block her path. After a few seconds of tense silence, her gaze finally rested in the center of them, and she spoke. “Tahir of the Redclouds, I presume?”
“I suppose I should feel honored that you know my name, your highness.” Tahir answered, stepping forward and giving a light bow. “I just wish it was under better circumstances. What brings the leader of the royal knights and a sizable group of them down this way?” He asked.
The princess’s eyes narrowed, and she glanced between him and his companions. Perhaps she thought he wanted to stall for time, but after determining nothing unusual about this situation, she answered his question. “We have been informed by the mage’s collective that you, along with Theoris Kouri and Metilia Mannicus, have stolen relics from a research site of theirs. A ruin north of Balrech that they have claimed. By the time they reported this to me, the three of you had already left the city, and so I told them that I would keep an eye out for your return. If the three of you come quietly, there need not be any struggle. We’ll simply examine your belongings and allow the collective to identify what was stolen. With a brief questioning to give you the opportunity to explain yourselves.”
So that’s how they explained it. Tahir thought. He noted that she didn’t mention Hasio at all. Likely because they couldn’t easily explain away giving him gold to betray the party, and something like that would likely come up during a questioning where they’d no doubt use magic to make someone only able to speak the truth. “My sincerest apologies, Princess, but I’m going to have to decline.” He replied. The silence that followed felt deafening, but Tahir already had an idea of how this would go if he agreed.
He, Meti and Theo would go to the royal castle and be detained, they’d have their belongings taken and examined, and probably have the chance to explain that they did in fact get to the ruins first. Even if they didn’t, the items they identified would be seized by the collective, for their own ‘investigation’. They got the items back, they’d be inferior replications at best or just mundane items glamoured to look like the ones they gave up at worst, and he could forget about ever seeing Zorhe’s spellbook again. Even if they’d get everything back, he didn’t want to give the collective the satisfaction of even looking over the spellbook.
“You…?” The princess seemed confused, but Tahir felt a growing pressure as both mana and aura began to swirl around her, and he swallowed hard. He could guess she used aura from the armor and weapon, but he hadn’t considered her also being a mage. “I am afraid you misunderstand. This is not a request you can decline. If you’re not going to come quietly, we’ll have to take you in by force. I’d rather have you walk into a questioning than wake up to an interrogation.”
“I’d hope for it to not come to that, your highness.” He didn’t glance behind him, but he heard the sound of his companions reaching for their weapons. Just in case, he summoned the earth spirit, but he hoped she would give him the time to explain. “We’d be more than happy to explain the situation regarding the ruin to you, personally, but detaining us and letting the collective examine our belongings would do more harm than-”
He didn’t know what set her off, maybe the continued, active refusal to cooperate from Tahir, or perhaps Meti pulled out a staff and she knew to be wary of magic users, but the princess lunged, drawing her sword and going for an overhead swing in a smooth motion. Just before, Tahir felt the swirl of aura and mana around her coalesce, and a wave of force that he recognized passed through him just before she rushed toward them. “Get back!” He shouted to the group behind him, partially drawing his sword to block and filling it with all of the aura he could muster in the space of a second. Her blade met his, and it brought him down on one knee from the force of it, also cracking the cobblestone underneath him. He glanced up, panting, to the princess’s wide eyed look of shock.
An understandable look to have, since that blow would have broken through any normal gold-ranked Redcloud’s aura or magical shields and immediately knocked them unconscious. Still panting, Tahir spoke. “I suppose you’re not used to people being able to block you when you use quintessence, your highness.” He realized it once she started gathering energy. In his experience, he became mana sensitive after he unlocked mana, and aura sensitive after he unlocked aura, so most people would either have one or the other, making it hard to judge the amount of force going into a single swing. Even in the case of someone who had both, most people wouldn’t recognize quintessence, even if someone had used it against them in the past. Tahir, on the other hand, had firsthand experience using quintessence, so he recognized the energy before she lunged.
The princess adjusted the grip on her longsword, and took a deep breath. “So you could use quintessence as well.” She said, after a notable pause. “This changes nothing. I am still required to bring you in, and I ask that you come quietly.”
While he weighed the pros and cons of starting a fight with her and her knights, Tahir heard the door to Callipho’s shop open, and the man himself spoke. “Might I ask for a pause before this escalates any further.” The alchemist said, drawing the princess’s attention. “Over tea, perhaps? I think we could all benefit from a brief conversation.”