Chapter 42

Helsket had nearly concluded his business in the shop district, packages of dried goods, canteens, and fruit strapped to his back - only waiting on the paper Mikel had requested from the bindery as the store manager put his order together.

His thoughts were stuck on the trip he and Mikel were about to take. Well, not the trip, but what it entailed.

Erik was sick - deathly ill, and Mikel had hunted Helsket down to help him in an attempt to save the lord's life.

It wasn't something Helsket had ever envisioned, and yet here was the day he emerged from retirement as an old bear began to move after a long winter.

He was just thankful he hadn't needed to eat a ball full of grass to plug up his bum, as did bears before they hybernated.

"Will there be anything else, sir?" The store manager asked. He was a small man, mousy in the most physical ways. Small mouth with overlarge teeth poked out from below a nose which would look at home on a baboon's face, with beady eyes hidden behind half-moon spectacles. His wizened hair flowed as he moved, and no amount of brushing or grooming able to keep it in check.

"No. Just the journal, the paper, and the ink."

The man gestured to a stack of quills next to the pile of supplies, "Maybe a quill or two? They're precut to perfection - and only from the finest geese in Farraway. Only a Gunt each, if you can believe it, m'lord."

Helsket glanced at the goose feathers and chuckled, "I can pull a goose feather as well as anyone - and for less than a gunt."

The shopkeeper almost hid his scowl, only the barest outline of it slipping beyond the polite facade he maintained for his clientele.

Helsket only caught the sharp edge of the expression because of many hard years on the adventurer's trail where a wrong read on a person could spell certain death for you and your friends.

The shopkeeper was benign though - the man was little larger than a child and frail to boot.

Not like that bastard Telgil, Helsket rumbled internally. His body still ached from the brawls the two old friends had while visiting The Market of Dreams.

He'd never admit it, but Telgil was one of the few people Helsket truly counted as a friend.

"Alright then, that'll be -"

The shopkeeper cut short as a commotion out in the street caused Helsket to turn and put a light hand on the mace at his belt.

He fingered the haft and glanced at the windows of the shop - ready for trouble.

Someone was screaming bloody murder and Helsket was about to investigate further when, of all people, Mikel burst into the shop with his face red, sweat staining his clothing, and the look of utter terror plastered on his face.

Fuck.

"Mikel - what's -"

He didn't get the rest of the sentence out as Mikel crashed into him, babbling through gasps for breath. Helkset put his hand on his young friend's shoulder, only to draw it back in surprise.

Mikel was burning up as if he'd just leaped from a raging inferno set for him and him alone.

"What's happening, Mikel?" Helsket asked as he pushed Mikel away with both hands and held him at arm's length. He ignored the heat pouring off of Mikel as it wasn't hot enough to burn, just to enough make him uncomfortable. The thick calluses on his hands prevented much of anything from getting through.

He wondered how Mikel was still standing. He had to be as hot as the sun outside - enough to kill most men.

"Assassin," Mikel gasped, pointing behind him, "Demon. Time Demon. Back."

Helsket's blood iced over and he pulled Mikel close, glancing at the shopkeeper who was doing his best to appear as if he wasn't listening, while mentally jotting down every word.

There was nothing for it.

Helsket drew Mikel aside and provided an arm for support as the young man tried to get his story out. It was clear he was in trouble - and to mention such a thing as The Time Demon - it didn't sit well with Helsket. Didn't sit well with him at all.

The boy had already had a run-in with a dream version of the beast - there was no telling what had happened this time.

"Mikel - settle down. You're burning up. You need to take a deep breath and tell me what happened. Are you alright?"

Mikel nodded, but not before spewing out more words, Helsket couldn't follow. It took him a second to realize what was going on, but after he did more of the situation made sense.

Mikel was speaking backward as if someone had recorded his voice and was playing it back in reverse.

Minutes passed like this as the shopkeeper made not-so-discreet passes around the two in a clear effort to parse out the issue.

Helsket paid him little mind and instead concentrated on Mikel.

After calming down a bit more Mikel was able to speak normally and over the next few minutes related to Helsket what had just happened to him.

“Gods below, boy,” Helsket mumbled as Mikel finished his story.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“What you’re saying doesn’t make any sense,” Helsket said as Mikel shook his head, eyes filled with a mix of terror and anxiety, “you can’t just stop time. Even the Sunken Folk weren’t able to do that. They could manipulate time, sure, look at the Market of Dreams - but halt it altogether? That’s the realm of gods and -”

Helsket cut off, blood draining from his face as he turned to look across Farraway to his home. If Mikel was to be believed, and Helsket saw no reason other than the story was absurd, the boy had run the better part of three miles… While locked in a strange, time freeze - an ability only reserved for divinity... Or high-ranking demons.

“Boy, what did you say the thing that came at you in the time stop, looked like?” Helsket hated to admit it to himself, but he thought he already knew exactly what they were dealing with... Even if it seemed impossible.

Mikel tried to speak, breath still coming in short gasps. Bits of the golden chain holding The Callisto Jewel peaked from his shirt, but the gem remained hidden, tucked in the folds of the cotton shirt.

“Emaciated,” He heaved, “Skeletal. Black mask or cover on its eyes - scythe.”

Helsket swallowed hard and shook his head, “Dear gods, no. Not that.”

He’d been correct to assume The Time Demon, the bane of House Raithson, was back.

“It kept talking about how my death was reserved for… it and not the assassin who attacked me. Why was it there, Helsket? Why did it save me?”

Helsket’s stomach flipped and he felt sick. Not in ten lifetimes had he expected the very thing that had helped to end The Raithson family's adventuring days to crop up again - long after he thought it dead.

Long after he thought he’d killed it.

“We need to get to Stennin - now. We need to see Calcifer. He’ll have answers. I can’t speak to it. I just… Can’t.” Helsket choked up - the searing pain from a past long though sealed threatening to break the dam he’d built around the memories and trauma.

Helsket’s scar ached at the memory playing through his mind - of how the Time Demon they’d ended had nearly killed them all.

“Let’s go then!” Mikel exclaimed, standing upright for the first time since the boy had come barreling out of thin air toward Helsket, “There’s no reason to stand around here any longer! Whoever was in the cloak nearly killed me. If The Time Demon hadn’t intervened I would have been dead. Bugger it for saying my death belongs to it - it saved my life just now. And it cut me loose in a weird frozen world. The effect died off after I moved out of range of it, but it was still odd - nothing was right. Everyone and everything was frozen.”

Helsket swallowed again and turned to the shocked shopkeeper at the bindery. "You saw nothing. Heard nothing. Not if you value your life that is."

He flipped the man a silver Solaire and grabbed the pile of paper, ink, and journal off the table in a rush - not worrying about change. He also grabbed one of the goose feather pens - no need to leave it behind if he paid more than double for the times already on the counter.

“We’re safe for the moment,” Helsket said as he pulled Mikel behind him and out in the hot, crowded street, “The assassins, I’m not sure who they were, but chances are they won’t try anything again any time soon. They lost the advantage of surprise when they showed themselves to you - and whatever their aim is behind killing you would have worked had that… thing not saved you.”

The words felt ashen in his mouth.

The entire time he’d been an adventurer, save for a few blessed months early on when the innocence of youth still carried within him, he and Erik and the rest had pursued the Time Demon to contain its time-warping, world-shattering powers. Those first few interactions had proved disastrous in more ways than one, but at least none had died and Crest of Evening hadn’t been lost.

That came later.

Erik had suffered the most during each interaction between their party and The Time Demon - only luck (and as Helsket saw it, bad luck at that) had saved him from being a cripple his whole life. The Demon had done something to him that snarled his Essentia and Stamina use - A woman was all that had saved him from the pain of a warrior's failure.

Now, the thing was back and haunting Mikel, claiming the boy’s life for its own.

“Do you know why it was saying that?”

Helsket thought for a moment as he trudged through the crowd, a full head taller than most people.

Should I tell him? Oh, gods Erik, I wish you were here right now. You always were the planner.

“Helsket?”

“Time Demon,” Helsket barked, not turning to look at Mikel behind him, “If what you’re describing is true, and you were trapped in a frozen time state, then there’s only one culprit - the Time Demon your father and I fought years ago. It’s the one that claimed the Crest of Evening as the cost for its life.”

“Or so we thought,” Mikel said, trailing back from Helsket.

“Aye,” he said, turning to beckon Mikel forward, “Or so we thought. There’s nothing for it now though. I don’t have answers for you. Calcifer will and gods willing if we can find her, Sylix. We can figure out exactly what we need from her. Hopefully, those maps of yours are accurate.”

“They are,” Mikel said, “They are. At least as far as the information goes from them I sourced myself.”

“Then we’ll pack up, sleep and go. I have an old friend who’s a Watch Captain. They’ll post guards for us tonight and keep an eye on the house while we’re gone. Save doing that, our business in Farraway is done until the adventure concludes - whether in success or death. We've a dangerous road to walk to Stennin and I'd rather get started sooner rather than later.”

Mikel shivered despite the heat still radiating from him, Helsket chalked the heat up to some effect of the extreme time dilation Mikel had experienced.

"Time... We have lots of time, especially with the Time Demon after me. There's no escaping it - not if it can freeze time like that."

It was Helsket's turn to shiver, as the thought of another cataclysmic battle with such a beast seemed evident on the near horizon.