Recluse’s Cove was a small inlet farther up the shoreline. It was one of the greatest spots to fish on the whole island, but it wasn’t easily accessible.
One could hike the inclined path that led northward into the escarpment and then shimmy down a rather steep cliff full of loose rock, but most, like Wellynd and Klof, found it easier to wait until the tide was low enough to walk across the rock-lined coast.
Except Henry. Wellynd had little doubt that Ars Illuve’s most talented guster would have used his abilities to navigate the precariously rocky bay from the sea.
As he and Klof walked, Wellynd imagined himself as a guster like Henry. If he could even be half as successful as the first mate of The Brinebreaker, he’d be invaluable not only to Laine, but to any other ship that wanted to contract his services.
He knew there were other vocations for guster’s as well. One of the other gusters in town, Pelod, used his skills to bellow the forge fires up at the mine, but Wellynd had always thought those to be a waste of such an incredible power.
Of course, Wellynd’s mind eventually wandered to the more fantastical possibilities of controlling the wind. He couldn’t help but think of Nesta, the legendary archer from one of Usum’s tales, who used her ability to shoot arrows with deadly precision, bending them around obstacles, and deflecting the returned volley of her enemies.
He absently tapped at the stone he’d put in his cloak pocket as Klof helped him up a small cliffside. Wellynd was determined to prove his ability.
“You think you could fart and blow it at people?” Klof asked, wiping his hands and standing up straight.
Wellynd guffawed, shaking some pebbles out of his sandal. “Now I’m not sure I want you to pick this skill up.”
“Come on, I wouldn’t do it to you.”
“Yeah, sure. Like you don’t already try to do it to me.”
“Hey” Klof said, pointing, “is that Henry’s sail?”
Squinting, Wellynd could just make out the orange-dyed canvas beyond the next crest of shale.
“Let’s go” shouted Wellynd, as he began to jump carefully down the next set of rocks, Klof following quickly in tow.
Sitting on the beach, near the midbay, was Henry. A steady stream of smoke floated from his clay pipe.
Spotting the boys, he stood and waved, his long brown and grey hair catching the wind and blowing behind him. He bent over and rifled through a small leather bag that sat on the sand beside him before standing up and walking towards them.
“Ahoy, lads. Took ya’s long enough.” he smiled, before placing his pipe between his teeth and holding out both of his hands, fists clenched, toward the boys.
“Take these each of ya’s. Tie ‘em to yer wrist fer now.”
Looking askance, Wellynd stepped forward and accepted the bundle from Henry. It was a rolled strip of linen cloth. Unfurling it only slightly, Wellynd tied one end around his wrist. As he let go of the remaining bundle, it caught quickly in the wind and began to flap behind him.
“What is this? Planning on losing sight of us or something?” Klof asked, as he finished tying the cloth around his wrist.
Henry chuckled, “No lad. But you better hold onto it or yer gonna be in fer a confusin’ coupla hours.”
Henry furrowed his brow as he looked out beyond the boys. Turning, Wellynd and Klof saw the anchored hand sail, its orange sail furled at the top of the mast, the small platform, composed of two carved planks of wood, half-jammed into the sand.
“Prove what you can do here today, and someday you may just get yerself a lady like that.”
“Why can’t we just build one anyway?” asked Klof, turning back to a plume of smoke partly obscuring Henry, his wide smile just faintly visible.
“Well, ya could, but you’d be sure to sink not ten yards from shore. Winds not strong ‘nuff to carry the load.” Henry tapped out his pipe before cleaning out the stained clay bowl with his shirt. “Far be it from me to stop you wastin’ yer time, though.”
Klof snorted.
“Alright, well. We’re here. What now?” asked Wellynd.
“Patience lad. There are some things you need to hear before we start, so listen up.”
Henry moved casually as he walked toward the cliffside behind them. Unsheathing the sabre at his hip, he whacked at a bush and began pruning the twigs from the branch.
Making his way back to the boys, he pointed the cleaned branch to a spot of sand beside his bag.
“Sit. Make yerselves comfortable.”
Planting the stick into the sand, Henry twisted it until it bore deep enough that it could stand on its own, before hunching over and rifling through his bag.
“Now, what we’re doin’ out here might seem insane, but that’s just cuz yer stupid and haven’t seen the world yet.”
Looking up, he flashed a meek grin as he saw the reactions of Klof and Wellynd.
“Look, this is my first time teachin’ a shapeless, and I’m not a teacher.”
He pulled out a thick, dark green leaf from his sack and unrolled it, revealing a brown, seedy mass inside. Pinching off a finger-full, he stuffed it into his pipe before striking a match and inhaling deeply.
Henry closed his eyes and blew out a steady stream before plopping down on the sand and giving the two boys a stern look.
“So. We Kosun have a shape somewhere inside of us. Sorta like a container for magic. You pull it in from the air, and you stuff it into that container. From there you sorta release it again, except you try to convince it to do what you want it to do. You followin’?”
Wellynd looked at Klof, who was frowning, before looking back up at Henry
“Uh. We’ve both pulled before, but we’ve only practised pushing the...kos…do you call it kose too? magic...into jants.”
“I think i’ve heard that somewhere before. Don’t matter to me what ya call it. Anyway. There ya go. A jant is kind of like a container that does a specific thing. You know, like lift somethin’, like the trolley we have at the warehouse.”
Klof responded slowly “So...you have a jant inside of you that blows the wind?”
“Yeah, that’s one way to think of it” Henry nodded, taking another drag on his pipe as he watched them, the sound of the loose cloth flapping in the wind as the boys thought about what he’d said.
“Now, this jant inside of me is a special shape. It doesn’t look like the one we have in the warehouse, nor any you’ve seen before. It’s something that was taught to me when I was about yer age by someone you never met. It’s not somethin’ yer Uncle knows, or even anyone on this island. Mael, there ain’t anyone in all of Arta or Verta that knows it exactly. While you probly’ won’t remember all of it, ya need to give me yer word that what I show you today stays here.”
Henry paused, letting his words sit in the air between them.
“Well?”
“Yeah, I mean, of course.” nodded Wellynd, looking over to Klof who was sitting, eyes forward, not saying anything. Wellynd elbowed him.
“Ah, sure...”
Henry cast a discerning gaze at each of them before nodding and standing up. Twisting the branch from the sand, he took a few steps toward the cliffside and scanned the beach. Bending over, he smoothed out a section of sand before looking expectantly at the boys, who, in turn made their way to his side.
Closing his eyes, he began drawing something into the sand with the branch he had prepared. As he drew, Wellynd tried to follow the complex diagram of interweaving lines. Just as he thought a stroke would be the final line in the shape, Henry began making a series of smaller, more delicate lines that crossed the others. Some connected small elements together, whereas others scored through already drawn lines, thickening them. After a couple of minutes, Henry opened his eyes.
“There we are.”
“What in all of Arta is that supposed to be? I thought you were going to draw a nice looking circle or something”
“Weren’t you listenin’? That’s the shape I use to gust with.”
“But what does that mean? How do I get a shape, and how do you gust with it?
Wellynd felt a hand thump his back and he looked up, befuddled.
“Here” Henry snapped the branch in two before handing one half to each of the two boys. He pointed at the shape engraved into the sand “try to draw that, or at least something kinda like it. Don’t worry about the small details, you can figure those out later.”
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
“Wait, what about your mantle? Do we need to manifest it or...whatever?” asked Wellynd, glancing at Klof who nodded at the question.
“My what now?” scowled Henry.
The man looked genuinely confused.
“Uh...we heard that at the Observatory, it’s important to...”
“Rubbish. All of it.” interrupted Henry, before continuing, “Look, I’m sure there’s a time and place fer book learnin’. But it ain’t now, Welly. I never heard of a mantle, and I’m sure as the sea that what’er it is, it ain’t needed for makin’ the wind blow, lad. Now c’mon, let’s get drawin’.”
Henry held out the broken sticks, one in each hand, nodding toward them.
Klof eagerly snatched the stick and walked a few steps away. He began sketching into the sand, glancing back at Henry’s reference image every few seconds.
Wellynd looked at the shape one more time before he too began to try and recreate the maze of lines.
He traced the lines slowly into the sand, his eyes flicking back and forth between the reference and his own. He tried to remember the flow of Henry’s lines: which he drew first and which direction he drew them in.
“Too detailed” he heard Henry say to Klof.
Clearly, Klof was doing the same thing. Copying the small connecting lines from the start, attempting to include every detail that made Henry’s piece complete.
Wellynd scratched his head. Time to try a different approach. He started to focus on only drawing the bigger connecting lines, the ones that outlined the general shape.
“That’s better, Welly. You’re on the right path now. Both of ya need to get the big parts right first. That’s what’s important at this point.”
After another half-minute of scraping and etching, with Henry more quickly walking between the two, the sailor raised his hands.
“Alright lads, that’s good enough fer now. Take a few paces and draw it again.”
“What? Why?” asked Klof, who Wellynd noticed was eyeing Wellynd’s shape with a frown.
Henry chuckled. “Just do it. It’ll make sense later.”
For the next half-hour, Henry had the two boys carve the shape from memory into the sand for two minutes, and then instruct them to do the same thing further down the beach. Soon enough, Wellynd could no longer see Henry’s original shape, and could only work from his own previous iteration.
By the time they reached their tenth drawing, Wellynd knew that his own shape was only vaguely similar to Henry’s.
The first mate threw up his hands and beckoned the two boys back toward him.
“Right. That should be good. I think. Should be right good fer our purposes anyway. Let’s give r’ a go, eh?”
Wellynd and Klof shared a grin as they rubbed their hands together in unison.
“What do we do now?” said Wellynd.
“Well this is the harder part, at least fer now. Everyone does it different, see, and what’s gonna matter here is that you try to fill the shape with that magic ya’ grab outta the air. Once ya’ve done that yer gonna need to push it back out as the shape and…sorta…ask the wind to let ya do it.”
“What do you mean ask the wind?” Klof said, looking befuddled.
Henry took a long draw of his pipe, nodding his head as he let the smoke plume out of his nostrils.
“That part’ll take a while lads, an I don’ expect either of ya to get it today, but this is what those cloth’s ‘round yer wrists are for. Ya see, the bigger the task, the bigger the ask, at least that’s what I was taught an it hasn’t led me into troubled waters yet. Yer goal is to take the shape, give it to the wind, and just ask her to change the direction of the cloth. It’s hard to explain with words, at least for me. I do know that ya could learn the most complicated shape in the world and it’d be no good if ya can’t get the wind to take it. I’ve heard of folks negotiatin’, some pleadin’, I’ve even heard of gusters threatnin’ the wind. Can ya believe it? Me, I just ask her nicely. It seems to work pretty well, even when she’s fierce out on Elaudri. Anyway, take a bit o’ time to remember the last shape ya made, then go off further down the sands and see what ya can do. I’ll be here just mossin’ on the rocks if ya have any questions.”
Wellynd and Klof spent the next several minutes examining the shapes they etched in the sand. Wellynd couldn’t help but wander over to Klof’s.
“Looks like one of Laine’s sailing charts to me” he jibed.
Klof chuckled before pushing his friend away “Just you wait and see Welly. I’ll be teaching Henry by next week.”
Wellynd rolled his eyes and walked back to his own side to give his work one more lookover, before making his way further down the beach.
Klof walked off in the opposite direction, eventually stopping across from Wellynd on the other side of the small bay.
Henry had sat down next to his sail, staring out into the sea as puffs of smoke frequently billowed out above him drifting up in their futile pursuit to rival the clouds dotting the sky above.
This was as good a place as any, Wellynd thought as he angled himself to face out toward the sea, the breakers receding back into the water only a few paces in front of him.
Convince the wind to blow.
Really?
He sighed and shook out his hands before examining the cloth around his wrist whipping left and right, wrapping around itself before unfurling again as it attempted to fly off. Should he try to approach each step one at a time or just give it a go altogether?
He thought about the looming pain. Probably best if he took it one step at a time.
Throwing off his cloak behind him, he let the cool wind coming off of Elaudri ruffle his undershirt. He also didn’t want to use his stone just yet. He knew it could help him, but he also didn’t know how. If the strange artefact was slowly wearing away, he figured it best to exhaust every option before attempting to use it.
Holding the image of the sand-etched shape in his head, Wellynd breathed deeply and started to pull, the sensation of kose soon tingling his skin. He directed it inward toward his chest.
As usual, the pain shot through him immediately, but he ignored it and visualised the hot substance, suspended in a dark expanse somewhere inside of him. He attempted to mould it into the shape, envisioning his etching, directing the kose into its rough lines.
The first thing he noticed was that while the kose came in quite freely, it felt thick and heavy as it moved around in his mental space.
Every time he tried to funnel the reluctant energy into one section of the shape, another part of it would bulge out or or swell.
After twenty seconds of struggling, Wellynd released kose, unable to stand the searing pain.
He keeled over, his hands on his knees, breathing deeply as the abrupt relief from the pain washed over him.
This was going to be difficult.
Taking another deep breath of salty air, he pivoted his feet.
Again, he pulled in kose. Again, the pain erupted.
Afraid of losing it, Wellynd rushed to form a nebulous blob in his chest. Rather than form the kose into lines and distinct smaller shapes, he formed the energy into a hot ball that looked like an opaque outline of Henry’s etching: a sort of oblong sphere, with valleys and mountains etched into its rim.
The pain intensified.
Now what? He tried to will the different sections of the shape, his jaw clenching as he suppressed the instinct to let the kose out.
It still looked vastly different from his own etching, let alone Henry’s complex design. But maybe he could get a feel for it if he tried the next step.
He peeked open one eye and watched the cloth whip in the wind. How could he convince it?
He thought about how he used a jant and, uncertain of what else to do, began to force the shape down his arm toward the cloth. The pain was excruciating, and at one point, Wellynd thought he was going to faint. Gritting his teeth, he tried to make sense of the strange space between the mental and physical world and moved the shape to what felt like the area around his wrist. Then, he tried to push the shape out into the world.
Nothing happened.
The pain was unbearable.
In a last ditch effort, Wellynd tried to visualise the wind itself and imagined it colliding with the shape, the air bending around the nebulous blob of kose. He released it and opened his eyes.
The cloth continued to whip in the same direction.
For the next hour, Wellynd tried and failed what felt like a hundred times. While every subsequent attempt allowed him to practise making the shape, allowing him to closer replicate his etching in the sand, the effort of doing so was so exhausting, that by the time he had to convince the wind to accept the shape, his nerves felt like they were on fire and was unable to think clearly.
Wellynd plopped down and watched a small crab scuttle across the puddle on a rock onto the sand. It hastend up the beach towards the tideline, racing the remnants of a wave that had just broken onto the shore, but was pulled in by the receding waters just before it reached its mark. Wellynd jumped up and grabbed the crab before it washed out to sea and placed it back on the rock.
Maybe this wasn’t the right spot. He knew at least some of his attention was being diverted towards Klof on the other side of the bay.
Just as he was about to start looking for another spot, he heard the faint noise of a triumphant yell over the crashing waters. Glaring across the small bay, he saw Klof hooting and hollering, pumping his fist in the air, Henry walking towards him. Great. Klof had some sort of success.
If he couldn’t accomplish anything this day, Klof would be insufferable on their walk to town.
Wellynd ran over to his cloak and fished the stone out of his pocket, holding it tight in his hand as he walked back towards the tideline.
He moved closer to the water, letting the waves crash against his shins and the wind whip through his hair. Particles of sand blew in his face, but he resisted the urge to wipe them off or spit them away.
Henry’s strategy, at least on the face of it, wasn’t working. Time to try his way.
Wellynd thought about the way that he felt just before the strange events that happened in the cave and during the incident with Klent. Both times, he somehow felt connected to the ground beneath him, or, perhaps, something below that.
Closing his eyes, he searched for a familiar feeling, splitting his focus between the stone in his hand and visualising the earth beneath him. A black, vacuous space occupied his mind.
At first, darkness was all he could envision.
Nothing like that endless sea of light he’d felt beneath the cave.
Wait. There was something.
He shifted his feet. Far off in the dark realm of his mind’s eye, he could make out a speck. The sliver of that familiar feeling suspended deep beneath the sands.
Wellynd reached out towards it until it came to the centre of his focus.
Instinctually, he started to pull.
To his delight, kose flowed into him rapidly, this time with no accompanying pain.
Within a few seconds, the speck disappeared. He switched his focus to the kose around him and, again, there was no pain. What did that mean?
Not wanting to miss his opportunity, he quieted his thoughts, and began to form the shape. It was still difficult to control the unwieldy substance, but now he had time. No urgency of pain coaxed him to be careless.
Shaping and moulding, he eventually made what felt like a fairly accurate representation of what he had drawn in the sand.
Now was the hard part. Rather than trying to just will the shape into doing something, like he had been doing, he took a moment to focus on the wind as it continued to pelt his face with sharp specks, and imagined the wrap coiling around his wrist.
Unlike the previous attempts, Wellynd felt a sense of confidence that wasn’t there before. The same confidence he’d felt in the cave.
Without thinking, he superimposed the shape upon the image of the fluttering cloth while attending to the sensation on his face, willing the three to merge and shift to his desire.
Suddenly, the ground fell out from Wellynd’s feet as his stomach lurched and he shot up five feet up into the air, spiralling around like the winding cloth, before plummeting back down and crashing into the sand on all fours.
Well, that was something.