Chapter Ninety-nine

Krissintha Arlonet Dar Ghelain suppressed the giggle bubbling up and trying to get out. She smiled as the confused elves who had gathered on the forecastle platform heard Kevin’s voice, looking around as if they could somehow find the source of it.

Hi everyone, I’m Kevin and I’ll be your host for the duration of the upcoming operation. The spirit announced.

The only people who remained calm and unaffected — apart from Krissintha and Kiwa — were Master Fenirig Arte and his daughter. Until Hank introduced himself.

Hi, I’m Hank, and I’ll be your co-host. The weird brother burst into the voice-chat rather theatrically.

Shut up, Hank! This is my show! Kevin screeched at him.

‘Oh fuck, there’s two of them now,’ Fenar grumbled, shaking his head.

‘Two familiars? Is that normal?’ The captain of the Furious Fist inquired.

‘Normal? Nothing’s normal with this one. It’s just a meaningless word,’ Fenar said with a sigh, seemingly accepting the fact and ready to move on.

The captains of the Righteous Wrath, the Brave Soul and the Dauntless Will, as well as their officers and marine officers, were at a loss for words, coming to grips with the new and mysterious communication ability of spirits. The ranger officers were less shocked, but even they seemed like they didn’t know how to react to the voices in their heads.

Well, setting all that aside, let me explain how this works, gentlemen! Kevin said, then began to explain how he had assigned a number of different comm-nodes for different purposes.

He had put the captains on one node, the marine officers on another, the ranger officers on a third. A fourth node was dedicated to what Kevin called “cross-branch” communication, on which only the captains and the highest-ranking ranger and marine leaders were present. It meant that the lower ranks had only their own voice-chat to deal with and wouldn’t get tangled up in the chatter between the top ranks. Then, the spirits proceeded to explain to everyone how to “talk”, and then to the captains and masters of rangers how to switch between their dedicated comm-nodes and the “cross-branch” node. The latter was new to Krissintha, too, so she listened intently to the explanations, admitting grudgingly that Kevin and Hank knew what they were doing when it came to their communication abilities.

She wished they had been this well-informed and confident when it came to Mana and its effects. But after her meditation exercise, she had calmed down and even considered apologizing to them for her earlier outburst. After all, Kevin hadn’t been born a spirit, so it was somewhat understandable he didn’t know everything about being a spirit. She wasn’t sure about Hank; he had been born a spirit, but not like most familiars. Was it worth delving more into this just to prove everything was her familiars’ fault? Even if she wanted to, she couldn’t wrap her head around most of it, so it was best to leave it at that. “It was what it was, just go with the flow” as Kevin would say. Right or wrong, she decided to do just that.

An hour later, Kevin and Hank finished their lecture, and the gathered thirty or so officers all had a chance to practice talking to each other using their thoughts. Then, with the plan clear and preparations made, everyone was dismissed. It was time to get some rest before arriving and commencing the killing of orks and the rescuing of the taken.

***

No daylight was coming through the hatches when Toven woke Krissintha from her nap down in the crew quarters. Kitala Iwani was already checking her weapons and bags at the dim light of oil-lanterns, getting ready for the big event. Snippets of conversation echoed in her mind faintly; the thought-voices were in a discussion about positioning the ships, appropriate distances, and getting rangers to the shore. The captains of the four Solace Navy ships, no doubt. It seemed Kevin had done his best to separate the comm-nodes from each other, but as he had explained in the past, the whole setup was susceptible to leakage for some reason. As her connection to her familiar was stronger and more direct, she’d inevitably hear some of it. Luckily, it was far from loud — unlike the occasional grunts of desperation from Raagstrom Raagh, who was still in his little corner of Hell — and she could easily ignore it.

Krissintha clambered to her feet, rubbed the sleep from her eyes, and began to get her own gear in order; sword and dagger on her belt in the style of Solace rangers, then food rations, water, medical supplies and other small knick-knacks in her bag. She was sure Kevin had enough supplies for a small army in Jack’s Room, but it didn’t matter; if she had learned anything while training with rangers back in Gal Themar, was that getting her gear properly ready was the best way to avoid being yelled at by officers such as Master Fenar. Their bags of course vanished as soon as they were done packing, joining his familiar’s no-doubt impressive hoard in his spiritual storage space, but she could present it on request, so all was well.

Kiwa tapped her on her shoulder, the grin on her face no doubt a sign she was ready to face a hundred orks by herself.

‘Yeah, I’m ready,’ Krissintha said to the elf, then followed her up the ladder to the quarterdeck.

The sight of over eighty rangers, even in the darkness of night and without a single torch or lantern lit, was a sight to behold; the best fighters Solace had to offer, lining up by teams, ready and waiting for their turns to get into the rowboats sailors were already lowering onto the water. Krissintha couldn’t see the shore, but it couldn’t have been far — a mile, half a mile, maybe more, maybe less. It didn’t matter; the land was near, and the barbarians inhabiting it would be waking up to a blood-soaked morning. Or a rain-drenched one.

Just as Kiwa spotted Tovaron Ento’s team and started pulling Krissintha along to join them, the clouds released everything they had been holding back. She pulled her green, ranger-issued cloak together, pulling the hood over her head, the rain pattering loudly against the thick fabric.

‘This could be good,’ Tovaron Ento mused, looking up at the dark sky, just as they arrived to join his team.

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‘Will be harder for anyone to spot us,’ one of the rangers agreed, then turned his head towards Krissintha. ‘Might slow us down, though.’

She had seen the man around — would have been strange to see a new face on a ship — but she couldn’t recall his name. Regardless, he had a point.

‘Nah, she’s a spiritualist. She can keep up,’ Toven dismissed the concern with a wave of his hand and a smile on his face, turning to her. ‘Isn’t that right?’

Krissintha gulped silently. She had not told anyone about her Mana-predicament — maybe intentionally, maybe not — but in hindsight it wasn’t something she should have kept to herself. Sure, Kiwa knew, but her self-proclaimed bodyguard didn’t seem to have an issue with it, and she wouldn’t have said anything to anyone about it unless on “boss’ orders”.

‘Right.’ Krissintha nodded, hoping the combined efforts of the darkness, the rain, and her hood would hide the reddening of her face. It was too late to come clean about her temporary ban on using Kevin’s power. It would just complicate things for the team if she told them now, so the only thing she could do was to do better than her best and keep up at all cost.

Toven paused for a moment, as if unsure whether to believe her or not, then shrugged and turned back to his men.

‘Once we land, we have half-an-hour to find enough of the local plants to change our stealth-garbs, so work fast. Then it’s marching time. Close patrol formation at all times due to the rain, try not to trip over your own legs or get stuck in the mud, and if I hear another word about how much colder it is here up north than it is at home, I’ll feed you to the first greenskinned barbarian we come across. Any questions?’

‘Where are their bags?’ one of the team asked, nodding his head towards Krissintha and Kiwa, clearly disapproving of their lack of visible gear. Or maybe disapproving of the fact that Tovaron Ento hadn’t made an issue out of it.

‘Safely tucked away in Hell I assume,’ Toven said.

Krissintha nodded.

‘In Hell? What does that mean?’ the ranger asked, looking surprised by the answer.

‘Spirit fuckery,’ Toven stated. ‘Anyone else?’

The same ranger decided he had more things he wasn’t happy about.

‘How come Sarakan Zil’s got that connection to her familiar? She’s been assigned to this team. Shouldn’t you be the one coordinating?’

‘Listen, kid, it’s none of my business who Master Fenar designates for different roles or why, and it’s most certainly none of yours. Is that clear?’

‘Yes, sir!’ the ranger, who was apparently young enough to be called a “kid”, replied instantly.

A kid, huh? Even after almost a year in Solace, Krissintha still couldn’t accurately guess the age of elves. On the other hand, the kind of questions Kid was asking were an indication; Toven had once told her that younger rangers were often caught up in the fantasy of a perceived competition between teams — a leftover sentiment from their times as trainees. The memories of Training Team Twenty-Seven of Third Rangers brought a smile to her face, and she quickly came to the realisation that she’d much rather be with them than here, about to assault bloodthirsty orks in their hundreds. Life had really been taking one weird and dangerous turn after another, and Krissintha had every reason to believe it had plenty more in store. Because why wouldn’t it? Damn!

Then, it was time. Someone yelled something into the darkness — probably Master Fenar — and the team leaders relayed the order to their men: “get into those damned dinghies, and let’s find some greenskinned barbarians to kill!”

***

Krissintha didn’t even try to spot the dozens of other rowboats making their way to land; not only it was too dark for her human eyes to see anything that wasn’t right in front of her — like Kitala Iwani, chewing on some jerky as if all was well with the world — the rain, wind and the sea itself decided it was good fun to soak, freeze and confuse her all at the same time. Well, at least the sailors in the boat hadn’t asked her to grab an oar and help — unlike they had a few of the rangers — so she pulled her cloak tighter and hoped the waves wouldn’t get too big, and the twenty or so occupants of the boat wouldn’t have to swim ashore. She’d done that once before, and she wasn’t keen to do it again.

Luckily, the elves were relentless rowers, so much so that Krissintha found herself wondering why ork galleys used humans for that purpose — as dark and unpleasant as the thought was. During a brief moment of moonlight breaking through the clouds, she could see the dark silhouette of land against the dimly sparkling sea. She’d be on the ground soon, and then right in the middle of an entire barbarian clan. Without Mana. Not exactly what a sane person would do, even with a familiar who could eat half a town. But hold on! Was that really the case? It’s been more than a day since the unwanted revelation, so …

Kevin, how is the leftover Mana looking in my body? Or soul? Or both? She inquired.

Oh, so we’re talking now? The reply came, and the spirit’s tone was frighteningly similar to what she remembered her father sounding like after a few days of her mother’s stubborn silence due to whatever affront she thought he committed against her.

The thought occurred to Krissintha that maybe she really was on the wrong side of things in this thing with Kevin, whatever this thing was.

Yeah. I admit I reacted harshly, and I apologise for that. It’s just that I was scared. I mean, I could have died because of Mana, right?

Kevin didn’t reply, at least not immediately. After a few moments of silence, she began to think her familiar was trying to give her a taste of her own medicine by ignoring her — maybe a little bit rightfully so — but in the end the spirit spoke.

Well, okay, water under the bridge, and let it be a lesson learned.

A lesson?

Uh … yeah. A lesson.

What lesson?

A lesson to trust your familiar. I’m doing the best I can, and I learn as we go. Had I known this stuff about unused Mana accumulating, I would have told you. Now I know, and I’ll be keeping an eye on it.

Have you got eyes? Krissintha sent the thought, chuckling on the inside. Kevin having eyes — the image was suddenly in her mind, and it was disturbing. He was seeing with his spirit-tentacles, wasn’t he? The eyes then would be on them, right?

No, he hasn’t got eyes. Hank chimed in.

Oh. Hank. Krissintha acknowledged the weird brother.

Yeah, I’m Hank. He declared proudly.

So, about the Mana? She steered the conversation back to topic.

Hm. It’s going slowly, I’d say half of the stuff have evaporated already. Kevin shared his observation.

Will I be able to draw and use some once we land?

Kevin fell silent for a short time once again, then addressed Kiwa’s familiar.

Tilry! What do you think?

Uh … m… me? Well. She stuttered — something Krissintha didn’t know spirits were able to do, since they talked with their thoughts through the voice-chat. I’m … I’m not too sure, but it looks like she could get away with drawing and using a little. Maybe just enough to get her muscles to be a little faster, but not like she did on the ork ship. That was too much.

Krissintha thought about it for a moment.

So, I could use some to keep up with the rangers while marching towards the enemy? She asked.

Sounds like it. Kevin said.

I think so. Tilry agreed. But if you use more for fighting before allowing the old Mana to disappear, you might make things worse and hurt yourself, Lady Krissintha.

That wasn’t entirely bad news: she could keep up with Toven’s team, so at the very least she wouldn’t have to listen to them complaining about her slowing them down. And once in the fight, Kevin would probably just eat the enemy like he usually did. Spirits were weird, and she was getting used to it.

‘Look alive, people! We’re here,’ Tovaron Ento announced, not quite whispering, but keeping his voice low.

Krissintha lifted her head to look ahead, just as the boat lurched as it ran aground on the dark and sandy beach of Orkland.