Alistar followed the man’s instructions, a slight chill creeping throughout his body that made him feel as if he had just been dunked in a barrel of cold water. Aside from that, the weapon gave off no reaction. After standing idle for a few moments, he severed his magical connection with it while wearing a light frown.
“The predators will surely leave me be if I come down with a cold.”
“Ah, so it still works.”
“Is this really all it does?”
“What do you mean, all it does? I’ll have you know that nobody else should be capable of seeing or hearing you while your energies are powering the thing.”
“You’re saying I was invisible just now? But I was able to see myself.”
“Exactly. At the very least, an invisibility spell needs to be at the high magic level in order to completely hide someone from sight. The problem with that is that even the caster won’t be able to see their own limbs, which can be quite troublesome when you’re trying to keep quiet.”
Was the dagger really so amazing?
“How do I know that it actually works, though? It’s not like you can confirm it for me.”
“Fine,” snapped the man, who snatched the dagger from his hands with a weak, quivering grasp. “Then I’ll just teach you the damn spell. How familiar are you with light magics?”
“Not at all,” he admitted. “Teacher says my affinity with them is poor.”
“Who cares about affinities when you’ve got that much inner energy? Come, summon another bit of fire so that there’s more light in here. I’ll teach you how to bend it so that people will only be able to see what’s behind you.”
Rather than match the arrangement of his inner energies to that of a typical flame, as he did when casting fire magics, the trick to bending light was to mimic the residual energies that surrounded the flames. Following this principle, one could trap and redirect the light that spilled off of them and then rearrange it in a way that perfectly matched the composition of light that surrounded the caster. By doing this, they could effectively erase themselves from sight, for all that would be visible to the eyes of any onlookers was whatever scene happened to be directly behind, beside, above or below the caster.
“So if I keep practicing this,” said Alistar about an hour later, his body surrounded by a peculiar haze of shivering air, “I’ll eventually become see-through?”
“Effectively, yes. But unlike with that dagger, people will still be able to sense your aura unless you also use a concealment spell, and they’ll still be able to hear your breathing, your footfalls, the sounds of your clothes ruffling together—all of that will still be audible. Due to this, you’ll also need to learn a sound muffling spell in order to truly replicate the effects of that dagger.”
“So the dagger has three enchantments, then?”
“Yes, and together they form a true invisibility spell, unlike the light bending spell that simply hides you from sight.”
“Interesting.”
From what Alistar could gather, the famous invisibility spells of the modern day were actually light bending spells from the previous era. Depraved and destitute though the man might have become, there didn’t seem to be a single spell that he couldn’t cast.
“You might as well take the dagger along with you, for all the good it does me here.”
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Alistar accepted the weapon with words of thanks, holding it in his hand as he lacked a place to put it. He wasn’t likely to use it, for he would rather practice the three spells that made up the complete invisibility spell so that he could make use of such a technique at any time rather than whenever he happened to have the dagger on him.
“Is there anything else?”
“That should be all. Thank you, Aglain.”
“A bit presumptuous, aren’t we?”
“Yes, yes,” he smiled, standing up and walking towards the blacked-out entrance to the cave. “I’ll be back in eight or nine days with some more food and water for you.”
“Hah, I wonder how shocked I am in my confused state whenever I fumble around and find fresh breads scattered about this cave.”
“Not too shocked to eat them, from what I see.”
“Go on, boy. I’ve got things to do, people to meet…”
Alistar let out a dry laugh, deactivating the memory preservation spell and stepping over the threshold of the ‘independent space’ as his accomplice had termed it, emerging out into the early autumn evening before any of the man’s muddled rants could reach his ears.
Eager to practice the new spell that he’d been taught, Alistar shelved such thoughts and hurried back towards the county walls, hoping that his friends hadn’t been waiting too long for his arrival. After all, an hour in the cave equated to three or so hours outside of it, a testament to the skill—and malice—of whoever had trapped the man within its rocky confines.
***
“There he is,” said a red-faced Jaden, stifling a burp with a calloused fist before raising his copper flagon in greeting. “We were about to go find you and drag you here ourselves.”
Everyone was seated at the largest table within the tavern, an aged old thing that was well-polished from years of use. An impressive selection of roasted meats, both freshly baked and slightly stale breads, hard and soft cheeses along with several bowls full of roasted vegetables sat before his friends, alongside large clay jugs that had been filled with cool ale from the storeroom at the back of the little building.
“Sorry for the wait everyone,” he said, taking the only empty seat at the table. When an inebriated Zech began to fix him a plate, he shook his head and looked around for the nearest jug. “I’ll start with some ale, thanks.”
Taking the plate for himself, Zech let out a lazy laugh. “Suit yourself, but I’m not waiting any longer.”
“You guys didn’t have to hold off on eating.”
“Of course we did,” said Woods, who was still wearing the dusty apron that he usually wore while cooking. “There’s so many things to celebrate, so we can’t exactly dig in without you. That’s the whole point of this feast.”
“Exactly,” smiled Lily, brown hair tied back in the same style as Rosa’s. “Though you could have come sooner. It’s your fault Zech and Jaden are already drunk.” Since she looked so similar to her sister, she’d tucked a little white lily behind her left ear to create a bit of a contrast.
“I put a knife to their necks, did I?”
“Oh, come off it, Lily.” Jaden passed over a cup when Alistar failed to find one amidst the congested tabletop. “Finally, we can do a group toast.” Once everyone’s drinks had been topped off, the stocky youth raised his cup in the air and said, “You know, when Zech first tried to convince me to become a frontiersman, I had myself a good laugh. But before I knew it, he and Alistar began to teach me swordsmanship, I got registered at the guild, and then Helen and Corrie decided to tag along with us. Well, here we are, already holders of two-star brass badges. Who’d have thought that in such a short time our little team would be saving up to buy our own house?”
Zech rolled his pale blue eyes, which kept darting at the heaping plate that he’d just fixed himself. “You’re terrible at toasts. Here, everyone. To hard work paying off, and to all of our future successes!”
Jaden was a bit disgruntled in having been cut off as soon as he’d begun his little speech, but an under-the-table pat on his knee from Lily had him forgetting his frustrations and clinking cups with the others within a matter of moments.
“That’s not all,” added Emely. The shorter girl had brought Ms. Parsnip along as usual, the rabbit nibbling at a few bits of its namesake beneath the table. “Lily, Violet and Rosa just learned their second spell. Lessa’s teacher says they’ve got minor affinities for the earth element, probably from being surrounded by plants their whole lives. Shouldn’t we have a toast for them as well?”
There came another round of clinking cups. Having warmed up to the taste of ale in the months since the Lawsons had begun to regularly serve him the bitter drink, Alistar’s cup was already half empty, aided largely by the thirst that he’d built up on the long sprint back from the southern forests. They also congratulated Helen on having received a new bow from her mentor, a former orphan and well-known hunter in town named Ms. Ersen. Evidently the older woman no longer had anything left to teach her, a sign that Helen had been deemed ready to become a self-reliant adult. This acknowledgement clearly meant a lot to her, as it had come from someone that she looked up to and deeply trusted.