“You two are such fools,” snapped Johan, frowning as he looked down on Daniel’s boys. “After what happened this morning, did you seriously just try to harm them? What do you think your father would do if he found out about this?” He shook his head, contempt on his face. “To risk your inheritances for petty and unsightly intentions, if this becomes known then you two will become the disgraces of the family.”
“Our inheritances?” Calum ran over to his brother and helped him to his feet with an uncomfortable expression. “Father wouldn’t be pleased, but surely you don’t think...?”
“We were just playing a game,” breathed Edmun, who was only now catching his breath. “Calling us disgraces is going too far, Johan. You would think we were that useless aunt of ours, how you always talk down to us.”
“Yes, yes. We were just playing a game, there’s no need for you to butt in.”
While the brothers began to throw out excuses and deflections, Alistar calmly approached the three while discreetly reasserting the water that he’d just dismissed, which he gathered a pace or so beneath the brothers’ feet.
“I’m sorry you had to deal with…” Johan trailed off, noticing the water. “Don’t be hasty, Alistar. Be patie—”
Alistar strode by him, grabbed Calum by the collar of his tunic and yanked him inwards, meeting him halfway with a well-timed punch that broke his nose with an audible crack. It happened too quickly for the other boy to avoid it, despite the fact that he’d tried to pull away. Edmun didn’t hesitate to leap toward him with a bloodthirsty growl, but he tripped over himself as his feet were abruptly cemented in place by a sudden surge of water that completely encased them from the ankles down before instantaneously hardening into ice. Edmun fell face first into Alistar’s right knee, a crunching sound coming from one of the boy’s pale cheeks.
As the brothers lay there, stunned in both the figurative and literal senses, Alistar looked down at Edmun with a gaze that contained a lifetime of hurt and hatred, feeling as if he were staring at the red-haired guards from Crystellum themselves. Seeing this, the older boy went completely still as if he were a little doe that had just come face to face with a hungry wolf.
“I’ve done everything possible to win you over, but you two seem determined to make an enemy of me. Since that’s the case, then let me tell you this.” Two icicles formed at the tips of his fingers, a process that came easily to him after his practice from the night before. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re both terribly weak, so do yourselves a favour and stop pestering me and the girls. You’d do well to remember that if you ever lay your dirty hands on them or anyone else that I care about again, then I’ll risk everything to make you pay for it. Everything. Do you understand me?”
Having regained his wits, a blood-soaked Calum lunged for him only for his bent nose to suffer more damage beneath Alistar’s boot. Cloaking both of the icicles in layers of swordsman’s aura that were light enough to not cause any deadly damage, he threw one at each of the brothers. They followed the projectiles with wide eyes, the icicles fragmenting and then falling apart after half-embedding themselves into the compact dirt of the age-worn pathway. Thin slits slowly opened up on the right cheeks of both boys, fresh blood mingling with that which already marred their faces.
Both of them had been shaking with rage, but now that they had met Alistar’s icy glare and seen its sombre depths, the bloodied pair quieted down and fixed him with meek, humiliated stares. It was as if in this moment, the two realized the difference between sparring with those that were unwilling to hurt them and engaging in an anything-goes fight with an actual adversary.
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“I’m sure your father would be ashamed to hear that a bastard like me was able to make quick work of the two of you at the same time. If you agree to leave us alone for the rest of your stay, I’ll heal you both so that nobody will know what happened here.”
“How do we know you won’t tell anyone?” said Calum after a moment’s hesitation. His face was very red, though from swelling or embarrassment it was difficult to tell, especially since it was mostly covered with blood. “And can you even heal us to begin with? This isn’t something that can be fixed by some basic mending spell.”
“I should be able to. Anyway, it’s likely that all of us will be punished if we bring this up at home, so it’s in our best interests if it’s kept a secret.”
The brothers showed that they at least had some sense to them, both agreeing to his terms without any kickback. He hadn’t been sure if he would be able to fully heal their injuries, but with a heavy investment of inner energy and enough focus, he managed to mend their broken bones without much trouble. Johan watched the process with intrigue, his gaze intent enough to reveal that he was studying Alistar’s technique more than simply observing it.
Shamelessly, Edmun also requested that the burns he had received from Anice be tended to as well, which Alistar did without complaint. Once they had been healed, the brothers left in a hurry, the older of the two assuring the younger that he had only lost control of his spell because he lacked an affinity for fire magics.
Johan hadn’t spoken throughout the entire process, had simply watched with silent, calculating eyes from the side of the earthen pathway. Once the brothers had finally left, he approached Alistar with a pensive expression. “I’m surprised that you have dual attributes.”
“Isn’t it common?” he said, downcast. A sickly feeling settled in the pit of his stomach, not quite regret but something close to it.
He was a bit distracted by his thoughts, for the moment that Edmun and Calum had left he had been hit with the reality that his fate was essentially in their hands. Alistar knew that he should have shown more restraint, but he also couldn’t blame himself for stepping in to defend the girls. It was what his master would have done, and there wasn’t a shadow of a doubt that his father would have done the same.
I should have just let Johan deal with them. After a moment’s thought, he assured himself that had that been the case, the brothers would have just sought him out at a different time in order to harass or hurt him. It would have been the same with the girls as well.
“Not as much as you seem to believe.” Johan put a calloused hand on one of Alistar’s shoulders, noticing his absentmindedness. “And about what just happened. Don’t worry too much over it. If they go back on their word, I’ll volunteer an explanation.” A light, somewhat grim smile momentarily found its way onto the young man’s face. “I don’t blame you. When they insulted your mother, even I thought about doing something for a moment. Still, you’ll hear such things from time to time in the company of my father and Uncle Daniel, so be sure to keep a cool head if it happens again.”
“I will,” he sighed, running a hand through his short, honey-brown strands as he wondered why such a prejudice existed against the women of their clan. “Thank you for intervening, by the way. What were you doing here, anyhow?”
Hearing this, Johan’s eyes grew wide with panic. “I nearly forgot. I was on my way to meet Priscilla for lunch when I noticed what was happening. After all these years, she’s finally agreed to an outing with just the two of us, and I…” Looking in the direction of the city, he waved at the girls, who were still idling by the hill in a quiet and uncertain manner, and then patted Alistar on the back. “It seems we’ve got similar tastes when it comes to women. The Silvus girls are quite pretty, aren’t they?”
Alistar followed his gaze and noticed that Lessa’s face had taken on a lot of colour, the girl subconsciously turning her head away as they looked at her. Both she and Anice were staring at him with appreciative, almost furtive gazes.
“T—they are.”
“Best of luck to us both, then. I’ll leave you to it, though, for I need to go woo my future wife.”
Throwing the hood of his cloak back over his head, Johan rushed down the pathway and on towards the city beneath the overcast sky. The girls ran over the moment that he disappeared around the bend, as if they had been waiting for his exit the entire time.