“Y’talla, can you understand Roxu?” Elach said aloud.
“Yup, I can.” Y’talla answered. “Do you need me to translate while you go practice?”
Elach paused, his hand in the middle of parting the squirming curtain to the outside. “I thought you couldn’t hear my thoughts all the time?”
“Try not making your thoughts so obvious.” Y’talla laughed, appearing beside Elach and reaching up to pat him on the shoulder. “Go kidnap a tree, or whatever. I’ll make sure Shar and Roxu make a plan that isn’t too stupid or dangerous.”
The sounds of idle chatter and creaking wood cut off the moment the curtain closed behind Elach, leaving him alone with his thoughts as he walked towards the nearest tree. For some reason, Y’talla thought he could do this. And she seemed to understand his Issi almost better than Elach could, so maybe it wasn’t as far-fetched as he thought.
A purple and green swirled tree that smelled like a mixture of lavender and mint took the brunt of Elach’s first attempt. He pressed his hand to it and took a deep breath, getting a good sense of the Issi running through his pathways and pushing it towards his palm. The shackle around his wrist rang with a low, constantly rumbling note, and the tree exploded backwards under the force of an inadvertent push.
The long trail scoured in the dirt spoke of Elach’s mistake, a frown etching itself onto his face at the bizarre turn of events. He’d never misfired a technique before. A passing glance down at his hand showed the lines on his skin fading from a slight white-green glow. Elach curled it into a fist and willed that Issi back into his pathways, grumbling to himself as he went to put the tree back in place. He didn’t want anyone finding this place because he’d screwed with the plant life.
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“What in the hells is wrong with me?” Elach hissed, slamming his fist into the huge tree that he’d managed to push back ten feet. “I’ve got to be missing something. There’s no way I’m losing my mind.”
He backed up, scratching his face in frustration as he readied for another attempt. Every tree he’d tried to take in did the exact same thing; they’d flown backwards in a burst of Issi that felt almost exactly like a push without being damaged whatsoever. And the three bushes had done the same, scurrying through the dirt like a small animal before slamming into another tree and knocking berries loose.
Berries that had come into his headspace without any trouble whatsoever. If he hadn’t taken in that spine a while back Elach would have thought it was a size problem, but the smallest bush he’d tried to take in was a quarter the size of the spine. It just didn’t make sense.
Another tree skidded backwards, and Elach was almost ready to give up. He let out a long breath and plodded to put it back in place, but was stilled by the sound of rustling underbrush on the other side of the beaten path. He reached out with his Issi senses and got back a feeling that was barely distinguishable from the trees around him, a feeling that would have gone unnoticed if he hadn’t heard the bushes rustling.
“Hello, volunteer number one.” Elach murmured, bending down just before he chained himself straight through the rustling bush. “And thank you for your service.”
The rabbit-like creature was clad in shadows just like Izzik’s people, with fur the texture of rough-grit sandpaper and eyes that barely stood out from the rest of the shadows with a slight red tint. Its ears split into two at the base, flailing about pointlessly with barbs that clinked off Elach’s bare skin as if he were wearing armor. It opened its mouth to screech in a high-pitched whine that was accompanied by a wave of Issi, but it proved to be nothing but an annoyance in the face of Elach’s mental defenses.
“Quiet now.” Elach said as he clamped a hand around the rabbit’s mouth. “We don’t want you drawing any attention.”
The sounds stopped instantly, and the rabbit went limp in Elach’s arms. He could still feel it breathing, though, so he knew it wasn’t dead. Maybe that was how it fooled predators? Elach shook his head and spun up the transfer technique around the rabbit, chains spiraling around it as he readied himself. But something pressed back that gave him pause.
The rabbit didn’t want to be taken. It pressed back against the technique. Elach frowned and tried to force the rabbit into his headspace anyways. The explosion was small and contained, but it left him reeling backwards and seeing spots while the rabbit screamed itself raw and scurried away in a panic.
Elach was reminded of Sentence exploding when he took a drink of Flow’s Issi without permission, and suddenly everything made sense. He was trying to take Issi without permission, and all the defense these trees could muster was to change the technique from a pull into a push. From an intake to an expulsion.
He was suddenly holding a coin, rolling it between his fingers like he’d done with a link of chain before. Elach didn’t have to look down to know what it was, as he could feel the twin sides with his fingers. The link of chain now had many allies, a constantly roiling sphere of chains that shifted through solid metal. The technique that took the real and converted them into ethereal, in his headspace. His symbol was the opposite; it composed everything that he was on the outside, and all the techniques that struck at reality. That was what Prisoner’s coin had given him. The ability to buy passage from the ethereal to the real, and from the real to ethereal.
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“Whatever that means.” Elach chuckled, palming the coin and sending it back to his headspace. He stepped close to the last tree he’d try his technique on, placing his hand gently on its bark and shaking his head. “I can’t believe I’m about to ask a tree for permission.”
He cleared his throat, looking around to make sure neither Shar nor Y’talla had stuck either of their heads out of Roxu. “Uh, hello fruit tree. I want to take you into my headspace. There’s plenty of dirt and something like water, so how about it? Would you like to come in?”
Absolute silence. Elach felt like an idiot standing there talking to an inanimate object, but it was at least worth a shot. He sucked in a short breath and let the technique go.
Chains flashed into being, draining his container dry within seconds as they tried to cover the entirety of the tree. Elach let his breath hiss out and cut the technique short, dissolving the chains to try and recuperate as much of the loss as he could. But he could still see everything in his mind’s eye. The tree standing tall in its fruity glory. A network of underground roots, entwined with others like it in a struggle for water and nutrients. He could take it all, if he had enough Issi.
“Whoah.” Elach murmured, backing up two steps and looking at the tree with newfound appreciation. “Maybe I can do this. Thanks, tree.”
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“This isn’t a plan. Hells, it’s barely half a plan.” Elach sighed and shook his head, knocking his knuckles against a poorly drawn map for emphasis. “How don’t you know anything about Lighthome? Didn’t Izzik say anything about it while he was here?”
Roxu creaked as it thought, then shook slightly. Elach took that as a negative.
“Maybe we shouldn’t have let Izzik go.” Shar mused. “Though something about him rubbed me the absolute wrong way. He might not have survived long enough to help us with the way he was acting; catching those wisplings completely soured what little good was left in him.”
“You won’t be attacked on your first visit. Probably.” Roxu said quickly, and continued just as quickly. “One visit to scout the halls of lighthome, search for the largest source of light, and plan an escape route. And a second visit to steal away that light. Unless Izzik brings trouble to you, this should be fairly simple.”
Elach gestured at a spot on the map circled in red. “Digging a thirty foot deep hole is simple? There’s no way your roots are buried that far down.”
“Light rises up.” Roxu said plainly, as if those three words explained everything.
“Could you elaborate on that?” Shar asked, looking over her shoulder at a sleeping Y’talla, then to Elach. She waited for Roxu to elaborate, but as the silence stretched on, she spoke. “You’re sure you can’t bring her into your headspace? She really exerted herself scouting around with Flow.”
“Nope; I need permission every time.” Elach said with a shake of his head. “Maybe I’ll put together a contract that gives blanket permission when we’re out of here.”
Shar nodded. “That’s a good idea. And maybe you could–”
“Light acts like a gas when it is not constrained to a vessel.” Roxu interrupted, drawing Elach and Shar’s attention. “Unlike Issi, which has many different forms, light is limited to only one. A mixture between liquid and true light that evaporates far too quickly, leaving behind no trace of techniques or conflicts. If I’m going to take in enough light to help Elach pull me into his headspace, I’ll need time to absorb it. And the moment it leaves the soil, I can’t do that any more.”
“I hope that that is true. For your sake.” Shar sighed, circling a finger around a crude drawing of Lighthome. “I’m better suited to digging than you are, so I’ll deal with this hole while you visit Lighthome. Take half of the wisplings with you, and watch your back. If all Izzik’s people are like him, there will be countless knives aimed at your back.”
Elach looked down at the two lanterns that were resting on the floor, yellow wisplings floating lazily within the confines. He brought out Izzik’s technique one last time to see if they would be attracted to it, but there was absolutely no response from them. Something was different about these yellow wisplings compared to all the other colours Y’talla had brought into his headspace.
“It’ll be one long walk just to scout things out.” Elach pointed out, bending down to grab one of the lanterns. “I think it’d be better to dig the hole quickly, then hit Lighthome all at once.”
“If you’re moving by yourself, you should make good time.” Shar waved off Elach’s concern and gestured for him to leave. “Don’t underestimate your own speed. The problem will come when I go with you, as we’ll have to choose between conserving your Issi and conserving time.”
“Alright.” Elach shrugged. “I’ll be back by tomorrow. If I’m not, go kill everything in Lighthome to avenge me.”
Shar laughed a little too hard, a sharp edge under it that spoke of exactly what she’d be doing if Elach didn’t come back. He felt Roxu flinch away, but it was oddly reassuring to him. Having a weapon pointed away from him could be strangely calming.
Once more, the black squirming curtain parted and Elach stepped outside. The surprise that radiated off two large, hornet-like bugs was almost tangible; their light blue and vermillion lights flaring to life as one was wrapped in it and the other buzzed back while forming a vortex of vermillion.
“Hey.” Elach said casually, much to the confusion of the hornet in front. “Mind not trying to kill me? I’m a little short on time.”