“No!” Lyrua shouted. She grabbed him under his arms and spun him away. “You cannot just knock at a stranger’s door!” She placed him back in the road and readied her finger to scold him. The door creaked open behind her, and she turned to see a gnarled old mossfolk bending through the doorway.

The old folk aimed their hollow eyes at Lyrua, and the mossfolk’s mouth groaned like old oak as it opened, and held still as the words poured out. “What brings your kind to our wood?” they said.

“Excuse my son,” Lyrua pushed Athen in front of her and kept a firm grip on his shoulders. “Apologise to them, Athen.”

“Your house feels odd,” Athen said. Lyrua quickly opened her mouth to offer an apology in his stead, but the old tree had a response ready.

“It does.” She leaned further out of the doorway, holding her balance with crooked fingers on the doorframe. “This is a shop that carries unusual things. Things that have been lost in the sea over the years.”

“What does that mean?” Lyrua asked. “If this is a shop, why is there no sign? How is it full of things that were lost?”

“How do they end up here?” The treefolk pushed the door open all the way, and pointed her arm invitingly. “They find their own way. Separated from their owners, and lost for ages, they yearn to be loved again. But they are choosy about their masters.”

Lander tilted his head down to Athen who was pulling her arm and grinning so his teeth showed. “Boy will never let us walk away after that tale. I’ll check it out,” he groaned. He bent himself over to fit through the door and stomped into the old shack. The treefolk followed the violin hanging on his shoulder with their empty eyes as he passed. The building rattled as he moved around, until finally he poked his head back out. “Safe enough.”

Lyrua was apprehensive about taking her boy into a mysterious old hut, but Ove—wherever she was—and Lander would not let her if it was not safe. She left the parasol folded against the wall and brought Athen in. It was quite surprising not to be met with the filth she was expecting. It was earthy, welcoming, and poorly lit, like Fourstaile’s gardens at twilight. It brought her home in a comfortable way.

The room was set up like a shop, full of trinkets and baubles on tasteful shelves, sheltered in deep shadow. The display tables were plain, but well carved and polished with pretty cloths on top for decoration. It was all very tidy and cozy. A display shelf that served as the shop’s counter was lined with old odds and ends that all looked ancient and rusted by seawater. The open door at the back led to what Lyrua assumed was the old treefolk’s home. She urged Athen not to touch anything as he made his way around the candle-lit room.

“The forest names me Hente, and travellers call me The Retriever. I am a maiden of the forest,” the old woman said.

“Sermeledy,” Lyrua replied. “And my son Aellig.”

“Lander.”

The old mossfolk laughed, and her shaggy moss rustled like a bush in a breeze. “If you say so. What do you call the rook who lurks in your shadow? Or is it the one crouched outside my door?”

“Ove,” clacked Ove from outside.

Lyrua cocked her head back to look, but she knew she would not find Ove there, and she did not. She tried not to look too surprised. “What do you mean by ‘rook’?”

“A rook is a black corvid with a naked white beak. But surely you knew.” She rustled again. Lyrua was taken aback. Ove was a rook? “Don’t be alarmed,” Hente continued, “I am a very well attuned old tree, and Dark is among my specialties.” She made her way behind the counter, moving like a tree bending in the wind. “One must have four strong attunements to sense the mana currents, and even that is not normally enough. But it’s what brought you here, young man. So tell me, what speaks to you?”

Athen pointed at a stained figure of the Third Goddess, Luster Reginleif, tucked on a shelf behind a decaying wooden bowl. “This sings,” he said. Lyrua could not even imagine what he meant. To think she was missing so much because of her attunements. She leaned closer to the statue anyway, not really expecting anything. It was quiet.

“Yes,” Hente nodded, “but was it singing that led you here?”

Athen rested his head on his shoulder, and his eyes darted around the room. “No,” he sighed, “but I cannot find what was. I thought it was the house. It swirls around like the air, and sometimes I cannot tell them apart, but when I can, I follow the streams, and they lead to things. Like these trinkets. They all feel a little different.”

Hente shook her head. “My home is built on an intersection of liegelines, so the current of mana is strong here. I will be impressed if you can see through it and find what calls you.”

Lyrua felt completely muddled. Her eyebrows were getting sore from pushing down so long. Mana currents and trinkets that sang? She was confused and proud that her son could sense them.

Athen squinted at the counter. “Is that because they feel the same?” He shuffled over to the counter and crouched at it to look at the objects. Lyrua leaned close over his shoulder, but there was nothing that stood out to her. He pointed at a dirty ring, crusted from the sea, laying there forsaken. “It feels… Lost?”

“I think the word you seek is ‘obscured’.” The old woman picked the ring up with two careful wooden fingertips and placed it on the counter. “Its name is Tilsloret, and came to me only recently. If it belongs to you, you will have what it demands for its exchange.”

“Coins?” Athen frowned. “Is it expensive?”

“Not coins. Each item names its own price. Tilsloret was the ring of Christopher of House Thendrass, the last King of Marden Teradon. It was lost at sea when his ship sank fleeing the Collapse. He enchanted it to always lead him where he wished to go, so it can only be traded for something else enchanted by royalty. The highest price I have seen.”

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Athen looked perturbed. “Do we have that?” His eyes glittered with budding tears, ready for disappointment.

“I am afraid we possess nothing of the sort,” she told Hente. Athen’s lips pursed as he tried to push his tears back in.

Hente’s hollow stare carried an eerie wisdom , as if she were looking into Lyrua’s soul. “For the ring enchanted by the last King of Marden Teradon…” she began, “… A talisman enchanted by the last Queen of Nythyemere should suffice.”

Lyrua shook her head. Had she given her true name without thinking? Her memory of only minutes before was suddenly muddled by doubt. This woman could not know, could she?

A familiar tapping on wood sounded by the door as Ove entered the room. “A terrible blend, Dark and Dream,” she said, shaking her feathers. “Their conflict would have ended most folk in a deadly Night-mare just for trying. How are you skilled enough at Dark to see me in the shadow, and also enough in Dream to hear the history of things unliving?”

“I have been old longer than you all have lived.” Hente regarded Ove with a curious tilt of her head. Words poured from her mouth like a brook playing between old roots. “My partner has long since returned to sleep in the woods. I have had much time. I accomplish things you deem impossible through diligence and care that fleshfolk lack the patience for. The woods whisper of the Queen abandoning her steel walls, but you folk are too loud and hurried to hear what the trees have to say.” She brushed the tip of Tilsloret with a knotted finger. “If you leave without it, the young Prince will not be the only one who is disappointed.”

“What would you have me do?!” She shouted in a tone that betrayed her exasperation. “We have no such enchantment.” Lyrua was growing more frustrated waiting for the old woman to tell her what to do. She desired that ring. Even if the dirty thing was false, the chance of holding a piece of history… it was enticing.

“You have a talisman and you have attunement. Should I scratch a map to the conclusion in the dirt for you?” Hente rustled again.

Lyrua’s teeth grinded as she stared into the woman’s empty eyes. She would not have to tolerate her attitude if she were in Manataklos. She sighed. Manataklos was a memory now, growing more distant each day. She looked at Ove. “I have never succeeded at enchanting, even with gems blessed by a spellrector.”

Ove adjusted her wings. “You fail because you are impa-tient and feel entitled to succeed with expen-sive blessed rocks. The old tree just tried to tell you.”

Lyrua winced. She was impatient, but only because enchanting was so exhausting.

Athen took the talisman from around his neck and held it up to her expectantly. His sweet face was scrunched up with an exaggerated pout. She would have to succeed this time. She wanted that ring for her little man.

Taking the talisman from him she turned it over in her hand, looking for inspiration in the carvings. The sun-like depiction of the whirling Krakensea, almost life-like in its detail… A simple spell to give off light may work. She pressed the wood between her palms, pouring her mana over it. Through it. She had to permeate the wood completely. She used all of her mana, doubtful that less would be enough. In her mind’s eyes, she formed the image of the talisman. If she could recall every detail, and imbue the wood with a perfect mana duplication, the enchantment would hold. It was much simpler with a gem to duplicate in place of the jewelled item. And a spellrector’s blessing to slow the rippling mana.

Her Light shimmered and twitched, threatening to shoot away as light was wont to do. She had never succeeded here, but she was stronger now. If she could only stabilise her recreation… but she could not. Sweat clammed her hands; the detailed edges were impossible to keep still. In a moment of aggravation, she let the Light slip and it burst forth, flooding her mind’s eye with a brilliant starburst. She panicked and pushed back, forcing the Light down until it shrunk into itself, and inverted into a black outline of the talisman that seemed to take light rather than give it.

She could not see if it was flawed, so she sealed the spell before it could waver. She wiped sweat away from her eyes and opened them to see Athen’s bright expression looking up at her. The room appeared different, brighter. She spun around, and the room was… not bright, but clear. Her vision cut through the shadows to see clearly what nestled within them. The talisman she clutched was now dark in her hand, as if the light did not quite reach it. It improved visibility not by shedding light as she had intended, but by drawing more for the bearer. She smiled at it, suddenly unsure if she should part with it for an aged ring that may not even be authentic.

“It seems you have uncovered an interesting property of Light,” The Retriever said, extending her hand, “that there is power even in the absence of illumination. You will discover more still when you understand that absence is not always the same as shadow.”

Lyrua hesitated, but she knew if she could succeed once, she could again. There was no reason to hold onto it. Even if she had forgotten her patience and succeeded by luck. It would not be luck the next time. “My son should decide if he wishes to trade,” she said, “the talisman is his, after all.”

She gave it back to him, and the moment it crossed hands, the room darkened around her. She could no longer see his face clearly, but she heard him cooing with amazement.

“Incredible!” he said. “I can see in the dark!”

As her eyes adjusted, she could see her son again. “Hold it up near the candle,” she told him.

Tilting it towards the sagging candle on the counter, he moaned in disappointment. “I still cannot see it,” he said, but Lyrua could now, and the engravings were clear. As the light bounced off the ring of waves on its surface, they did move. She told Athen, and took the talisman back so he could see. His excitement was clear as she returned it to him. She thought he might want to keep it.

“What name does a thing like that bear, I wonder?” the old tree asked.

Athen placed it on the counter. “It helps you see in the dark… Like a torch? No, torches are boring. This is special. It can keep someone safe, by helping them through the night without revealing them.” For a moment he became lost in reverie, staring into the swirling etchings. “Just like Lyskilde,” he finally said.

“Lyskilde,” Hente repeated, nodding.

“But the price for it should not be as high as Tilsloret, or else it will never help anyone.” Athen continued. “Do you hear what it wants?”

“I do,” she said. “An object enchanted by royalty, it says… unless the need for it is righteous, and then it would settle for a firm left-handed shake.”

With a satisfied grin he took his ring. A glimmer of blue flashed beneath the filth as he turned it over in his hands.

“You can clean it with Swashbuckler’s Cure, if you come across any.” Hente set Lyskilde on the shelf where Tilsloret had rested, and shambled over to see Lyrua and her companions out.