"Don't worry, they're not poisonous," her maid added as Rowena kept looking at the flower bed while trying to drink her tea and eat her snacks.

'Poisonous? Was that a concern?' But then she remembered. 'Of course, it would be.'

The book had briefly mentioned that the Isidora was a hybrid of two rose varieties, one of which was poisonous. The silver stem was derived from the Anatola, a blood-red blossoming rose, with black spots on the petals, that contained a powerful neurotoxin.

The more black spots they had and the larger those spots were, the more poison they contained. Some were even entirely black.

Rowena's great-grandfather had spent his life creating these special roses in his wife's likeness, yet she passed away before seeing the final result. He had made sure the poison was neutralized when he planted them all over the Nerena Marquisette in her memory. That was the story she knew.

That and the fact that her mother had been the first to be born with those eyes and hair after her, which was why she had been named after the flower in her turn.

She put down her empty cup and stood up. "I'm going back to my room," the noble said, "there's something I want to work on, so I want to be left alone until dinner."

"I understand," Norina replied as she helped the maid next to her clean up and watched her lady leave the conservatory.

When Rowena entered her room, however, she first went to her desk, opened a drawer, and reached for her correspondence paper. But as she did so, she paused for a moment. Something felt wrong, though she didn't know what it was.

Again she had to close her eyes and shift her weight to stand up straight. There were two different ways to distribute Mana, this was one of them. She had done it before, a while ago, so it was easier now.

It still used more Mana than the direct distribution method, where Mana was infused into an object by letting it flow naturally through contact with the palm. Channeling Mana to leave the body like a second entity, also called a "Vector", and moving it separately through the atmosphere, against the natural Mana inside of that atmosphere, consumed quite a bit of energy in and of itself.

It was a good thing she still had dinner to look forward to, considering her plans for the evening.

Her Mana left her body like smoke rising from a piece of timber slowly heating up on embers before catching fire. Normally, it wasn't necessary to send out Mana to sense fluctuations, but when the residuals were very small, it wasn't enough to just feel the movement as before.

Her own Mana moved around her desk. This time, when the energy around her knocked on her door, she invited it in without a second thought. She could feel human Mana that was not entirely familiar to her.

It was like a drop of something in her tea, that she couldn't see, that she couldn't smell, but on her tongue she could feel. There was no notable difference just by looking at it or probing it, but she knew by using her own Mana and taking it back, sensing that it wasn't quite hers anymore; it wasn't quite clean.

And since she had Norina and Ava around her all day, she would know their signature very well by now, it almost felt normal, so it was neither of them. And no one else should have been at her desk since she had arrived.

"Who am I kidding?" she muttered to herself. 'There's a pile of that shit right outside my door.' Of course, she knew who it was from.

She might not have a particular sense of him yet, but it certainly wasn't Logan Randall who had booby-trapped her bedroom entrance.

Who else, if not Colin van Varnhagen, would have gotten his hands on her things while she was out having tea? She should have been more careful when she went out.

A thought struck her and she immediately ran over to her bed. Her pearly eyes were fixed on the section stuffed with dolls and pillows when, hidden deep between them, there was the leather case she had been looking for. Relief set in, for she could feel no difference in atmosphere in that part of her room, he really had just been searching her desk.

"Damn, that was close." Good thing she had physically destroyed her failed drafts before, he might have gone through her paper bin as well.

Anger welled up inside her as she sat down, took her paper and quill, wrote letter after letter, changing, thinking, marking her words, scratching her thoughts, racking her brain until she had a result she could be proud of.

Something so ordinary had taken her so long that her maid knocked on the door as she pressed a seal without a crest into her sealing wax. Rowena didn't have her own seal yet, she would have gotten one, had she had her debut.

But that was fine as long as it was sealed at all, so she put it in her desk drawer and got up to follow Ava down to the dining room. She really had a long night ahead of her, so she should eat as much as she could.

And so she did. Her maids and her brother just looked a little more intently at what she was doing, while she herself was at least distracted enough not to shoot angry looks at the young man with the same hair color as her own.

She didn't talk to him either, but stood up as soon as she was done and turned away. "I'm going to turn in early today. I'm very tired."

"Hm," was all she heard in response. Colin didn't know what to tell her, he hadn't found anything on her desk or in her drawers, nothing that was out of place. Nothing she was working on, nothing special in her trash, she was just doodling, it seemed.

So why had she been so angry when he came in earlier? He had knocked on the door, so that couldn't have been it. This time, he didn't just barge in.

The young master wouldn't have given it much thought if it had been the usual case with her. If she had simply looked at him as if he was despicable by the mere virtue of his existence, he wouldn't have batted an eyelid. But the way she had looked at him, it felt as if he had somehow betrayed her.

And even when she was sitting at the table, some of that was still there. As if she didn't trust him, even though he hadn't done anything to deserve it. She couldn't have known that he had gone to her room, could she?

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He went out of his way to bribe a servant who passed by, and it wasn't one of the two she had brought with her, so they wouldn't have told on him. And he made sure to barely touch anything visible to the naked eye, and to put everything he picked up back exactly as it was.

He was unable to comprehend her behavior and wondered what could have caused it while Rowena was already halfway to her bedroom. "You two can take the rest of the evening off, I won't be leaving my room tonight. I'm feeling a little down."

When Ava heard that, she was reminded of how her mistress had once been. It felt like an eternity had passed since then, but that was only because she had changed so much in such a short time. In reality, not even a month had passed.

What if she went back to the way she was before, feeling that her life wasn't getting better? "You have to call us if you need anything," she said.

Norina, on the other hand, didn't feel so pressured by her mistress wanting some time for herself. Still, she felt a bit sad, because it seemed as if she had something on her mind, but there was no one she felt comfortable confiding in, and it made the blonde maid a bit sad to see that from the lady she served.

"I will," her noble mistress replied and disappeared into her room, leaving the two of them outside. Since she had already said that she wouldn't leave, she demonstratively locked the door behind her.

There was a bathroom attached to this room as well, just like in the capital's mansion, but in this case, the bathroom had no additional door to the hallway. The only thing that would allow one to enter the bedroom was the large entrance that she was now securing.

She promptly turned around and gathered things from her room. In her wardrobe she found a long, black cloak with a hood on it.

Nobody would believe that a noble was hiding under it, but at the same time it was made of high quality fabric that a commoner could not afford. More importantly, it had a Mana Stone inlay that regulated the temperature to a comfortable level when worn.

She grabbed another indoor dress, one she had already used, that wouldn't be chosen for her again anytime soon, as well as an old leather bag.

Mana Stones, gold bars, the map as well as her blueprints. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail, hidden beneath her hood. She also needed silver ore, but she could probably buy it at the place she was heading to.

Silently, she opened the large glass door to her own balcony, stepped out and looked down. The cold hit her as she stood there. But she just pulled her cloak closer to her and let the warmth it created envelop her, at the same time dialing up her own Mana.

There were no trees close enough, no convenient trellis to climb down from the second floor, and the walls on each floor weren't exactly failing in height either. No wonder her brother really didn't care about any other way than the doors to check if she was sneaking out.

But in her case, it was more helpful than not. She took a deep breath, there was nothing she could do but try. When no one was around, she jumped over the railing, concentrating her Mana into her ankles and bending her knees when she landed to take the pressure off them. She didn't have to roll out, it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be, since she hadn't jumped that high with that body before.

With that out of the way, she ran, dodging the people around her, sweat pouring down her forehead. According to the map, there was a four to five mile radius from her estate to the city walls in any direction. The village she wanted to get to was another two miles northwest of Vandenberg. The sun was already starting to sink significantly, it would be setting very soon.

In the town, she grabbed a bottle of water and some food to replenish her energy. "Have a nice trip," the lady at the booth said as Rowena nodded, holding her hood down so she wouldn't be able to see her eyes too well.

Of course, Rowena couldn't stay down on the streets. She looked very small under her cloak – an expensive cloak – with no companions around her, and obviously hiding her identity. The perfect victim to rob. One who would probably not even call the city guards.

It would also be faster if she could run ahead without having to worry about the alleys between the houses. A dark passage looked very inviting at that moment as she slipped in and looked up. Her hands ached as she focused most of her Mana on her legs, and the cold house was not easy to climb.

Still, once she stood on the roof, she made sure that no one had seen her. But everyone was busy packing and going home. The streetlights flickered and came to life, but as the spot under the hanging lamp was the darkest, for the people walking in the light, with her where the light was not directed, the roofs high up were drowned out in the shadows after dusk.

It still took a while. Running, jumping, rolling, taking a second to breathe, all while making sure she was still in the dark. Even after passing a yawning guard at the city walls, she still had to run through a frosty field and into the mountain range that belonged to the Varnhagen territory.

Why did she have to do all that? It was simple: she needed a weapon.

But why, if she didn't intend to reveal her abilities and didn't even have her contract anymore?

Because something might happen. 'Life always kicks your ass, if you think you can take a rest.'

And to be prepared, she needed this weapon. Hand-to-hand combat was one thing, but it always involved a weapon, otherwise how would the Mana be able to affect the Visitor? It would be much too difficult.

Mana was first created by the Visitors when they consumed Life Force to use their powers, no matter how elaborate it was – and that depended on the Grade they had reached.

A Grade 5, a Sentinel, would have distinct physical features and unique abilities, his very own personality. While a Gradeless, a Will'o'the Wisp, didn't even have a presence yet.

The first time she had to face a Sentinel, someone else had to pay a high price. She never wanted to be in that situation again. She never wanted to be thrown around unprepared again.

That's why the right weapon was of paramount importance. One that was good at distributing Mana, one that would enhance her movement style, and one that was very durable.

Many weapons weren't meant to be used against the Visitors. There were bullets made with Mana, yes, but they were expensive and scarce. Arrowheads had the same problem, though they were used more often because they were easier to charge with Mana and easier to retrieve.

In the end, a Mana Stone was just a mass of Mana, just like a Vector, but a hundred or a thousand times more dense. As mentioned before, it took a lot of energy to create a Vector in the first place, so it was easier to dye an existing mass in one color than to conjure up new Mana and make it do one thing consistently. That's why Mana Stones were vital.

And they needed Mana to fight the Visitors, since they could only be harmed by Mana or Salt.

Truly, Visitors had Mana as well, but only inside their bodies, just as humans who channeled Mana and everything in nature had Mana now. But they produced it themselves, and humans only absorbed it from the Aether after the Visitors released it there.

Since Mana was a byproduct of the Life Force that the Visitors ate, it was essentially something that had gone through their system once and was eventually discarded.

It repulsed them in the same way that humans are repulsed by their own urine. 'Unless you're Bear Grills,' she thought. But Mana recycled through a human body was different, as though it had become radioactive. 'From urine to uranium, basically.'

What Rowena didn't understand was that they didn't care about human Mana when they dug their claws and fangs into them to suck out their Life Force. As if it only became relevant once it was released from the body and back into the atmosphere; the Aether.

A dead body would have its Life Force transformed into Mana unique to humans within a moment after death, for example, leaving only Mana inside and releasing it all around for years to come. That was why the Visitors didn't like getting close to corpses at all.

Her thoughts stopped when she saw smoke ahead of her. She had believed she could see it in the darkness a while ago, but now she clearly saw it. The lights of the village in the mountain range, the place that came after she had seen less and less stray houses around on the field while getting closer to it.

It had also started to snow about half a mile away. As if the mountain range alone was covered in snow.

After passing whitened pines, she could finally slow down and take a sip of her water, drying the sweat from her brow, for she had almost made it. Her body was hot, and not just because of her cloak, despite the weather.

Small, mostly gray looking stone huts stood cozily in a clearing of the forest, but she could feel the heat coming from them. It was crazy to her. It told her she was exactly where she wanted to be.

She had reached Eisenwacht.