Chapter 15
Leather Armor and a Black Box
“Here, take the thing in the box.”
Telgil held out a black, velvet-covered box with a dark opening at the top. Mikel was unable to see into the darkness and was hesitant to reach in. The last time he’d been forced into a black, spooky-looking portal hadn’t ended well. The smell of char from the priestesses' attack was still thick in the air, even above the smell from Telgil’s smithy.
The dragon forge did emit smoke every so often, but like other magic vapors, it didn’t smell anything close to the dirty, black stuff that normal fires produced. Unlike the azure fires of typical torches which smelled of roses, the dragon forge smelled of something deeper and of an unknown quality. Although not in the same room any longer the smell pervaded the entire structure, and identifying the smell had given Mikel reason to pause, his hand hovering over the box. They had moved from the smithy proper after they’d recovered enough to breathe easily… And for Helsket to harangue Mikel again and again about how bad of a fighter he was.
The show area was immaculately clean and well-ordered, like the forge. Hammers of varying sizes lined the walls while a smaller, decorative central forge was kept hot by a magical blue flame. Rack upon rack of different weapons populated the walls in various stages of finish, while armor held prominent places on dummies formed into different shapes and sizes of people. The service counter was off to the right and was made of a simple block desk. A large book of available merchandise sat on the block along with another book with equipment available to order. A large set of windows looked out onto The Market with more wares on display. Currently, the storefront was closed and dark - and yet people still milled around outside in the street - the eternal and unending night no impediment to their revelry and commerce.
Mikel glowered at the box, then looked to Helsket for guidance.
“You got me,” he said lightly while staring out of the windows.
Helsket popped out of his dark mood infrequently before diving headlong back into the morass. The occasional moments of levity were interspersed by sharp critiques of Mikel’s performance in the fight or equally barbed comments directed at Telgil.
Helsket’s mood had been sour since their encounter with the Priestesses of Gaia, and he’d shown no improvement even as Telgil presented him with wave after wave of new and improved weaponry the old warrior could play with. Aside from a few lackluster swings, Helsket had done little but sit and stare off into the distance.
Every so often Telgil would glance at his friend with worry, but he refrained from saying anything. Mikel did the same. He hadn’t experienced what Helsket was going through, but out of respect, kept his mouth shut.
Neither Mikel nor Telgil held it against him, but Mikel wished Helsket would just snap out of it. If loving a woman could do this to a man Mikel was second-guessing his life plans. Being a bachelor for life was looking better and better by the day.
“Mikel,” Telgil prompted, snapping Mikel back to reality. He’d let his mind wander to things apart from combat and the trial at hand.
Mikel blinked and shook his head, “Sorry. I’m… Tired. It’s been busy the last few days. You want me to stick my hand… In there?” He pointed at the box, unconsciously delaying what he knew was inevitable.
“Is this going to bite my hand off?” Mikel asked as his hand hovered over the dark box.
“No - Not unless you’re a god. Or a devil. Same difference.”
Mikel screwed up his face in confusion as Telgil waved his free hand, “I’m joking. I’m joking. No, this is just a monitor. I guarantee the person who came to test your magical ability had one of these in their inventory even if they didn’t use it.”
“Why use it now then?”
“We’re going to see if there was anything the investigator missed. Your father was a unique case - and I’m still unsure of why he was able to use your family's heirloom sword as he did. The stories I heard about Erik’s fighting were related to the fact that he wasn’t trained to or couldn’t use Immaterial Skills - and yet was able to weave Essentia at the level of a Master. I always chalked it up to a faulty testing protocol, but now… I’m not so sure. Take the thing out of the box and we’ll see.”
Mikel sighed and nodded before reaching into the box. He winced, but nothing happened and after a moment of fumbling around in the dark he pulled out a smooth, obsidian orb about the size of a large egg or a standard-sized orange.
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Once free of the box his hand went ice cold and an ache began to creep up his arm towards his shoulder. Mikel winced before Telgil spoke loudly.
“Just hold onto it. I know it’s uncomfortable - but it’s how the test is done. It’s sampling your inherent capabilities and after it’s done we’ll be able to tell exactly what you’re good at… If anything.”
“Oh joy,” Mikel said, “I’ll finally be able to quantify just how useless I am.”
“Don’t beat yourself up over that fight,” Helsket said, still gazing outside, “Even Telgil and I were chased off. A group of angry women - priestess women, is never taken lightly - especially ones as powerful as those. Gaia is nothing to trifle with, not even in passing.”
“Why do you think they attacked us? Is it because you picked Celine up like that?”
Helsket shook his head slowly, “No. No, I don’t think so. Celine barely recognized me, but she knew my name. I think… I think something else was off, but I’m not sure what. I’ll have to ponder the whole event more before I decide how to respond. Seeing her… Well, it was like seeing someone back from the dead. I mourned her, buried a scarf I had from her instead of her body, and moved on. It was… abrupt seeing her.”
The ache had reached Mikel’s shoulder and to avoid thinking about the sensation, he concentrated on the conversation.
“And you’re sure it was her? I mean, she was beautiful and I can see how she’d be almost impossible to confuse with anyone else… But it’s been ten years. How can you be sure?”
“I could tell as soon as I touched her,” Helsket said, “Her skin… Felt the same as the last time I touched her. Like silk, but warm and firm. There was never a material like it elsewhere, nor another woman with skin like that.”
Mikel’s heart wrenched a little at the forlorn tone in Helsket’s words. He’d never had a great love like that, but as a man, he could imagine the hurt his friend was going through.
“Ow!” Mikel yelled at the hurt he was going through ripped through his chest like a firebolt.
Telgil made a motion with his hands to caution Mikel to be still, but hopping about was nearly all he could do. The pain, and worse yet, the sensations creeping out from the pain, were causing his body to short-circuit. Just as he was about to drop the orb the pain ceased, leaving in its wake a thick numbness like his arm, and all areas where the sensation had touched, had fallen asleep.
He couldn’t stop his hand as it relaxed and the obsidian-looking orb dropped like dead weight.
Only Telgil’s quick reflexes stopped the orb from hitting the stone floor of the shop and shattering. Mikel suspected Telgil was more than a proficient smith, but doubted whether he could put something like the orb back together.
“And that concludes the test,” The smith said as he plopped the obsidian sphere back into the velvet box, visible relief plain on his face.
Mikel wondered if he’d known that would happen and had prepared for Mikel to drop the orb, or if he was just as quick as he’d hinted at.
“Give me just a minute and we’ll be able to see what was going on inside of you.”
“Great. I’ll be here. Trying to get the circulation going in my arm again.”
Mikel massaged the muscles and bones in his numb right arm until, long minutes later, Telgil returned with a small glass box with the orb somehow suspended within. His arm felt marginally better but still refused to work properly.
“And here we go. This will display exactly what we need to see.”
Telgil pulled over a low table and a few floor cushions to sit on. He handed one to Mikel and another to Helsket who simply stared at the red cushion before setting it aside and letting his gaze shift from the windows to rest on the box.
The glass box was about one foot cubed - with sharp edges and the impossibly floating orb inside. There were no shadows or reflections cast from the box, to Mikel, the only real reason he could see it was the razor-sharp edges which seemed to cut the fabric of reality around them.
“What… What are we waiting for?” Mikel’s gaze was locked on the floating orb within the box and was disappointed when nothing happened immediately.
“Well, we’re waiting for something to happen,” Telgil said with a hint of frustration in his voice, “Normally - oh, here we go.”
Telgil cut off as the orb inside the box began to shimmer and shift as if it were no longer made of cold rock, but instead something malleable, like a black, liquid rubber.
The three men watched as the orb first expanded, then contracted again and again and again until on the final cycle the orb shrank away to nothing, then in a flash filled the entire space within the cube and clung to the inside like glue.
Then, nothing more happened.
“Is… That it?” Mikel asked as he shifted on the cushion to find a more comfortable position.
“No, it’s not.” Telgil said, simmering with irritation, “This isn’t how this is supposed to work. The orb was supposed to fill the space and then shift into a set of symbols showing first your Cross Association - positives, negatives. Good and bad. I’ve never… Seen this before.”
“I have,” Helsket said, only half paying attention.
“Oh, then please enlighten us oh sage of magic,” Telgil said, clearly irritated. He tapped the top of the cube, frustrated.
Helsket shrugged, “Same thing that happened to the boy's father. I saw it happen when Sylix showed up for the first time. She was originally after the same thing you are right now - Information.”
Telgil shook his head, muttered something then grabbed the cube and hustled it away to a dark corner of the shop to be forgotten until he could figure out a way to deal with the strange reaction of the orb.
When he returned he was carrying a set of rugged-looking leather armor, metal-plated gloves, and a dagger to match the sword on Mikel’s hip.
“Here. Get dressed. We’re going to see what you’ve learned on your own since you remain an enigma of Essentia.”
Telgil dumped the pile in front of Mikel, turned, and walked back into his smithy without another word.
Although Mikel wasn’t watching Helsket, Helsket was watching him like a hawk. He and Telgil shared a glance before Mikel grabbed a leather pauldron and pointed at it.
“I’ll need help putting this on. Never done it before.”