“You and Anne would be better off avoiding them,” said Corrie, not looking up from his book. “No contact, no problems.”
“That’s probably for the best, though I’m not sure how well that would work.” There was a certain etiquette that had to be followed when meeting with other nobles, even if the parties involved were directly related to one another. To ignore the presence of two dukes and their sons would likely cause offence. “Well, there’s still a decent amount of time before they arrive, so I’ll give it some more thought towards the end of spring.”
“Lucian’s sake,” muttered Jaden, jumping up and patting down his backside. “This log is still so wet.” Looking at Alistar, he said, “How long are you gonna watch us shiver before you get rid of all this moisture?”
“Oh yeah,” said Rosa, who had been running her fingers through her ponytail in an absentminded manner similar to her less talkative sister. “You can use water magics too, can’t you? Please, Alistar, would you get rid of some of this wetness? I hate the cold.”
“It’s pretty warm though?” said Woods, who was helping himself to his fourth fish.
Jaden smirked. “Maybe for a walrus like you. Unfortunately, the rest of us don’t have nine more layers of skin, so…” Looking at Alistar, he snapped his fingers in a coercive manner.
Alistar rolled his eyes and willed the water in the immediate vicinity to trickle away from the campfire area and into the murky currents of the Greyline, which seemed to have darkened in step with the overcast day.
“Never gets old seeing that.” Jaden looked a little envious. “Wish I could do magic.”
The others echoed his sentiment.
“Who said you can’t?” said Alistar. “It’s not strong, but I can sense energies within all of you except for Woods and…well and you.” He forced a cough. “Just forget I said anything.”
“Are you making fun of me?”
“Apologies, Jaden. I just spoke without thinking.”
“Is that true?” Corrie looked up with shining eyes, possessed by a quiet sort of excitement that was unique unto him. “About the magic?”
Alistar nodded.
“How come I can’t feel anything, then?” asked Lily. “Wouldn’t I notice something like that?”
“Anne didn’t,” said Emely, thoughtful. “Though it’s Anne, after all.”
The group was seized by an excited buzz of conversation, at least for the most part.
Zech unrolled one of the large leaves that they must have collected prior to getting settled, placing the roasted fish on top of it and handing it over to Violet. “I don’t care about magic.” He spitted another fish and then returned to roasting. “I’m fine as long as I’ve got a sword in my hands.”
Jaden put a thick arm around Zech as if the other boy had just thrown him a lifeline. “Exactly! Who needs magic, anyway?”
“You literally just said that you wished you could do it,” Helen pointed out with a teasing smile.
“Is that what you heard? Women really hear whatever they want, huh?”
“Why would I care if you can do magic or not? You’re just embarrassed.”
“Don’t tease him,” said Lily, who shot Jaden a supportive look. “I’ll learn what I can, and if you ever need anyone to do magic for you, just let me know!”
Jaden showed a freckled blush and ducked his head, a consistent reaction when it came to conversing with Lily. Even though he had just turned fourteen, he was more nervous than ever around the eldest and most outgoing of the triplets.
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Helen spoke up again while plucking bones from her food. “I’ve been thinking. Maybe we can all become frontiersmen like you, Zech.”
“Just because you want to be one doesn’t mean you are one. I’ve still got a long way to go before I can even register at the guild.”
“I still think it’s silly,” said Emely, brushing some of her dangling hair from Ms. Parsnip’s face. “Most of them end up dying anyway, don’t they? Just think about how many people have gone missing around here over the past couple of years. All for the sake of killing other creatures that are just minding their own business.”
She was referring to the heightened amount of traffic that the frontiersmen guild had been drawing as of late. Distan County was on the very frontier of the empire, so it had always been commonplace to see groups of these daring adventurers wandering through the streets of Mayhaven as well as within the smaller towns and villages in the area. Even though the entire county was surrounded by stone walls—constructed with Caedmon’s inheritance, as opposed to the palaces that his brothers had commissioned with theirs—there were still plenty of rare herbs and minerals just waiting to be harvested in the local forests. There was also a diverse presence of unique creatures and danger beasts whose populations needed to be maintained lest they harass any travellers that were heading towards or leaving Distan, dangerous tasks that were usually delegated to the frontiersmen guild while being subsidized by the crown.
“Do you think it’s real?” asked Lily. “That new dungeon they discovered in the Tall Mountains?”
Everyone grew quiet as the topic shifted to one of regional interest.
“It’s real,” said Zech, suddenly downcast. “Our tavern’s a pretty popular spot for people that are just passing through. Normally they return from excursions after a couple of weeks or so, but none of the ones that left in search of that dungeon have come back yet. Some of them have been missing for months.”
“Bad for business, huh?” Jaden placed his fish on a leaf and then handed it to Lily without looking at her, merely mumbling in response to her thanks.
“It’s not that. I just don’t like to think that they’re all dead. Some of them have been stopping by for years and are friends of my family.”
The so-called dungeon was actually a series of tunnels just a handful of leagues outside of Distan’s borders, somewhere between Caedmon’s county and the one in Baldor where Alistar had lived as a slave. Dungeons were usually referred to as labyrinth dungeons, since nine times out of ten they were either an abandoned mine or a network of natural tunnels that had been carved out by ancient creatures, similar to the lower, prohibited levels of Crystellum. These were areas where natural energies tended to gather in large quantities, which often led to the formation of magic crystals, something that was very attractive to almost all living things. Just as Servan had explained to him years ago, any creature that interacted with such energies for too long had a chance of undergoing an evolution of sorts that saw its strength increase at the cost of its consciousness. Feral and ferocious, these creatures were known as danger beasts.
“I wouldn’t worry about it,” said Alistar in an attempt to comfort his friend. “Those sorts of people live their lives on the move, so they probably just followed the Winding Road across the border to Melsian.”
“I know. It’s just that the last group was the fifth to go missing this year, and you need to cancel an unfinished task before you can take on a new one, which none of them have done. I really hope they’re okay.”
“You’re better off worrying about yourself,” said Jaden, the bigger boy giving his friend a few elbow jabs. “For someone who wants to join those maniacs, your sword swings have been pretty weak lately.”
“I’d disagree,” said Alistar, touching a hand to his abdomen. “You’re just getting stronger, is all.”
“Must you boys always talk about your training? It’s always this stance, this strike, this tier, this stratum. It’s driving us crazy.”
The other girls agreed with Lily, though Helen seemed a bit jealous of their efforts. She had been dead set on learning alongside them, but the boys had turned her down as they didn’t want to take on the risk of hurting her.
They spent the rest of the afternoon talking about random things, mostly teasing one another or voicing their contemplations over what sort of profession they were thinking about taking up in the future. Jaden, the triplets, and Helen were all fourteen, with Zech’s birthday not far off. This gave them all around a year’s time to figure out what direction they wanted their futures to take. Naturally, the triplets were set to inherit their family’s flower shop, while Zech’s parents expected him to work full, steady shifts at the tavern once he turned of age. Woods wanted to become a baker’s apprentice, while Jaden had his sights set on becoming a fisherman. Aside from them, nobody else had the slightest clue what they wanted to do once the time came to flip the hourglasses of their youth.
Alistar didn’t stick around for much longer, since he suspected that Mr. Albeck would want to discuss the sudden change in his curriculum at the earliest convenience. With that in mind, he bid his friends farewell and then sprinted the whole way home. Once he arrived, he made his way over to the dining hall while panting heavily, covered in a light layer of sweat.